Homan and Chicago Ave.
Cross the blood
that quilts your busted lip
with the tender tip
of your tongue. That lip’s
blood is brackish and white
meat flares from the black
swell. You crossed your mama’s
mind so call her sometimes.
She dreams your dead daddy
still puts his hands on her
waist. She calls his name
then crosses herself, calls
the police then crosses
her fingers. Cross me
and get cut across your cheek,
its fat bag full of bad words
and cheap liquor you hide
from your badass kids. Make
a wish for bad weather
when the hoodlums get to shooting
in a good summer’s heat.
Cross the territory between
two gangs and feel eyes stare
and cross in a blur of crosshairs.
When a shot man lands
in the garden of trash the block
flares up like an appetite
spurred on by the sight
of prey, by the slurred
prayer of a man so death-close
he sees buzzards burrow
their bladed beaks into
his entry wound. Tune
the trumpets. Make way through
dusk’s clutter. After death
the dead cross over into song,
their bones tuning-forked
into vibrancy. Cross your lips,
mutiny against all speech
when a corpse starts singing
despite its leaded larynx. Don’t
say miracle when butterflies
break from a death-gaped skull,