Overheard

 Overheard

A guy on a phone in his ear on a bus on a rant

to a girl on the way to a dance as she whines to a friend

who's out on a break on a trip to a dive in the hood

in a fix with a wrap on her waist,

a scam to con a babe 

who's a catch with the eye of a trout

with a glint in its slit 

as the bog scatters blue,

is yakking too loud for our slouch of a crowd

jammed up to the straps as a bag lady breaks

the string of her Ked right left in a knot 

tucked back in the hem of her sock.

She couldn't care less what this peach of a prize

in his mother's martini 

pimento speared olive-green eyes 

has to badger the girl on her way

to a dance as she carps to her friend

and cries to a guy on a phone.

She Writes in Lemon Juice

 She Writes in Lemon Juice 

She bathes in baptismal muslin,

soaked bone-brown and wrapped

in twice-blessed river water,

once for the pain she ran from

once for the pain we caused.

"I'll shave my head," she begs,

"and weave a shroud to warm you."

When her face breaks through

the dunked-brown river water

she spits out a wren,

hoping for a raven, but a wren will do.

"We'll both be better off," she says,

a threat I take to heart.

Every timid stalking voiceless

after midnight call, 

quick breath on the line,

I know it's you.