dear love,                                              

remember the bamboo tiger cages in those goddamn movies. and napalm, sinister rain, deathly tangerine vapor veiling the islands, for simulation’s nothing like the real thing. the real thing. the real thing. military choppers of film script, steel demon birds, called away to quell real life dictatorship’s farthest outposts of rebellion. who among us could’ve told the difference? they have mistaken my home for a hollywood set of your home. even my language was a stand-in for yours. your country is not a war. my country is no longer mine. this i wished to tell you, because i was thinking of coming home to you.

yours.

Litany of the Blessed Virgin remix                 

Lord. Have mercy. Christ. Have mercy.
Lord.  Have mercy. Christ. Hear us.
Christ. Can you hear us?

 

Whoever the fuck is up there —

Have mercy on us. Have mercy on us.
Have mercy on us. Have mercy on us.

Holy Mary, pray for us.
Holy Mother of God, pray for us.
Holy Virgin of virgins, pray for us.
Mother of appropriated Christ, pray for us.
Mother of Hypocrites’ Church, pray for us.
Mother of Divine Punishment, pray for us.
Mother most pure, pray for us.
Mother most chaste, pray for us.
Mother inviolate, pray for us.
Mother undefiled, pray for us.
Mother most silent, pray for us.
Mother most compliant, pray for us.
Mother of severed tongues, pray for us.
Mother of the captured, pray for us.
Mother of our betrayal, pray for us.

Virgin most prudent, pray for us.
Virgin most disembodied, pray for us.
Virgin most self-denied, pray for us.
Virgin most unquestioning, pray for us.
Virgin most desexed, pray for us.
Virgin most impalpable, pray for us.
Mirror of technological violence, pray for us.
Seat of warmongers’ rhetoric, pray for us.
Cause of our naiveté, pray for us.
Spiritual vessel, pray for us.
Singular vessel of insemination, pray for us.
Mystical deflowering, pray for us.
Tower of the Almighty Dollar, pray for us.
Tower of bruised women, pray for us.
House of gold-hungry rapists, pray for us.
Locked Gate of Heaven, pray for us.
Morningstar, pray for us.
Health of trick turners, pray for us.
Refuge of venereal disease, pray for us.
Comforter of dumpster divers, pray for us.
Help of Christian killing machines, pray for us.

Queen of fallen angels, pray for us.
Queen of patriarchs, pray for us.
Queen of dictators, pray for us.
Queen of race riots, pray for us.
Queen of heathens’ torched flesh, pray for us.
Queen of tortured prisoners, pray for us.
Queen of virgins sold into sex trade, pray for us.
Queen of teenage whores sniffin glue, pray for us.
Queen of slumlords, pray for us.
Queen of smack crack and blow, pray for us.
Queen of cardboard shelters, pray for us.
Queen of gold-toothed pimps, pray for us.
Queen of cigar and rope burns, pray for us.

Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God.

That we may be worthy.

Pray for us.

That we may be.

Pray for us.

That we may.

Pray.

dear love,                                           

you dream in the language of dodging bullets and artillery fire. new, sexy diagnoses have been added to the lexicon on your behalf (“charlie don’t surf,” has also been added to the lexicon on your behalf).

in this home that is not our home, we have mutually exiled each other. i walk down your street in the rain, and i do not call you. i walk in the opposite direction of where i know to find you. that we do not speak is louder than bombs.

there are times that missing you is a matter of procedure. now is not one of those times. there are times when missing you hurts. so it comes to this, vying for geography. there is a prayer stuck in my throat. douse me in gasoline, my love, and strike a match. let's see this prayer ignite to high heaven.

parable                                               

the mermaid loosed her tongue against another, a twittering songbird in a sumptuous cage. the mermaid loosed her tongue as if she were extending claws to swipe, as if craving warm blood. in her sleep, a vision. a house of wire cages encircling the songbird. doves’ rank, rotted plumage. maggot-infested eagles, wings and beaks, clipped. lawin’s crusty, milky eyes. herons’ open sores, overcome with infection.

diwata came to the mermaid, stroked her thick, nightblack hair. do not fear, for one day the songbird will trill in a palace of pearls and summer seashells. and the mermaid breathed a sigh, lulled to sleep by the song of the ocean breeze.

(Ə-pŏk' Ə-lĭps')                                           
n.

dear love is it true there are no demons but the ones we’ve invented fallen

from firmament’s edges into oceans of fire harnessed splintering secrecy’s

epidemic trace salt circles upon stone virgins’ breached fortresses mercy

aversion

tell me your name awakens carved flesh sutures continue to pray once the

word is uttered the sky will open its thunder because doubt was never cast

no memory corroborates                      we exiles in the register of baptism.