Even after dedicating my life
against prayer, never having
written the word prayer, getting

self-conscious upon hearing
mention of prayer, I know
if I had a god to pray to

it would be the light fixture
in the jail cell I spent most
of a day in. It sat behind

textured glass, imitating sunlight.
At 2 am I thought it resembled
daybreak. By 2 pm, my cellmate

believed he was watching an overcast
morning. Now, I bow to it,
to study its changes in color

to understand the changes
in myself. I should consider
its correlatives with Dante.

What of the other sky behind it?
Is the universe organized
by relative distance from the light?

Then, I would abandon Dante.
Then, I would study the god
for itself. Is its light cast

from a lantern or from the god's
mind? When I learn
the answer I will abandon

the material world and enter
a field on the other side
of the glass, one implied by the light

(where true believers go). I'm sure,
at some point today, someone sang
God Bless America. I want

to ask them if they really believe
that a nation's legitimacy
depends on its being

the expression of a god. If
my god's light is unending
because the god is fed

by corporations and taxpayers.
Many of whom live nowhere
near this jail, but

many have driven by.

---

from "Decorporeal"

I hate it when people say andro
as short for androgynous
when the whole point is that
it translates to man-woman.
I hate it when people say man-
kind. Men are not kind.
You put it best: I love you
so much I could burst into flames.
It was raining and we pressed
on the stoop in front of our apartment.
I felt it too then, walking
down the bridge over the river.
My hand kept brushing yours.
My blaze could have swept this city
as easily as a volcanic eruption.
If you or I combusted
and the bridge collapsed,
would the other have lived long
enough to hit water?