Dimitri Reyes
HEADSTONE
Here lies a stampede birthed out of a single
smokestack made of many clouds and ham
burger meat marching on an empty stomach
flavored marshmallow. Twelve years old—
hands brandished ashy because a railing was
held too tight. A busted lip in a school photo.
The sensation of a cracked mouth feeling like
a scab bitten off the bottom lip. How does it
feel to miss missing when one feels never
missed? I never read your letters though now
I wish I could. Everything lavender. The
fudge stripes still in a dresser. Notes under
an antiseptic bed make a letter signed to my
self. Aside the pages popcorning fingers
around bitten nails. Cupcakes on pajama
pants, ironed-on puppies on a polo. Leopards
stealthing in cemetery brush in stained
glass. Don’t look in mirrors. You will see
the reflection of your tombstone.
The mortician said pressure and
space between your molars made
polished granite. Braces are the
rail road tracks never reaching
their final stop. The conductor calling—
Johnson & Johnson’s bubbling
in a tub. Smells like
sweet tarts. No tears
for faucet. No tears for
drain stopper. No tears
for you are waiting to meet me
where here lies.
ImissyouImissyouImissyouImissyouImissyou
ONLY ANSWERS THAT MATTER
Cleaning out the flower buckets from your funeral.
Malleable foam like moon sand.
Water trickling ink on a newspaper.
Anointed bugs picked from the pot, ancestral scarabs.
Icons that climbed in from our front fence,
carapace bronze, a checklist engraved on their wings:
☐ Do you know the chambers of hell?
☐ Were you a Sumerian priest?
☐ Is your maker bilingual?
☐ ☐ Were you part of the conquest? Conquested?
You answer ballot questions with questions:
☒ Will I continue to taste mojo and stain my lips with tomato paste?
☒ Will I continue to receive Lakeside Collection?
☒ Will I still be able to eat spanish olives again?
☒ Will I continue to rub my red kidney bean knees and use the
nail of an index finger to pick the skins between my teeth?
MEMO WRITTEN TO PARK AS WHITMAN
1993 (Age 0)
You were my grandfather’s favorite child.
That’s why I wanted to be born so early,
surrounded by trees, grass, and you.
1998 (Age 5)
My puffy eyes closed pink
on a kiddie swing— the budding
flowers leak honey. Textured juice
one half water one half tree’d sugar.
The spores overspread on slides—
heat, itching. Nature hurts. I couldn’t
wait to go back the next day, Friend.
2001 (Age 8)
How good of a little leaguer was I? You caught
every practice you saw every game. You heard
when I butchered the name, Roberto Clementé
in fogged sports goggles . I was in your company
when I played the game from the dugout, where you
collected spat sunflower seeds in mounds. Standing in
right field you showed me sweat and noise and chafing
and bullies and I showed you I didn’t like baseball.
2005 (Age 12)
My deciduous teeth decomposed
into the crevices of your bike path where you
left too many acorns scattered like strewn
marbles or shoes i’d leave by the doorway.
You taught me how to fall and bleed
and how to get back up.
2008 (Age 15)
I skipped school and you hid me behind
snowy trees. I wore black & looked like
tarmac sitting on stumps alone chewing
gum shivering chewing cheeks looking
waiting for the truancy that never came
I thought they’d got lost in you, like they
felt safer somewhere distant inside your
body as I did but I was just me & you &
snow.
2010 (Age 17)
Your exterior was ground solid,
your head bloomed in spring and
you managed a natural tan in autumn.
You didn’t mind being walked all over because
it was your leaves my girlfriends would jump in.
They’d be swathed by your better nature and
your holding-them-with-one-arm brilliance. We
smelled like dirt always streamed in the canal,
squatting under bridges, rolling down hills.
2014 (Age 21)
One day I’ll flourish.
One day I will be just as brilliant,
but for now I’m just blades of grass.