words

chase it with sugar to make it go down,
stir it with your plastic spoon
the purple blood of doom
and still it kicks your tongue
and rapes your throat,
a burning current in your esophagus
its aromatic terror is like napalm,
watch it corrode the snifter
like battery acid at desert noons,
feel the rust in your veins
and the rot in your gut,
goddamn it is worse than everything,
goddamn it sears the skin from your lips
and goddamn it is worse than everything,
hear your soul collapse around it,
feel your lungs default at its mention,
but drink it, drink it,
drink it like a dying crow,
obey the jerk in your gullet,
just drink it till the end is dry
and the gnats go drunkenly home.

she is a dark-eyed crook
stealing my wine when i am gone from the room,
marking the placement of the glass,
hiding her fingerprints in mine,
listening for my predatory footsteps on the stairs,
the turning of the doorknob,
the lock cylinder coming home,
like a shadow smoking my cigarettes in the dark
where it was formed
then sitting on the bed waiting,
palms downward, smoke between her fingers,
a burning stalk rising from her silent hands
and maybe she confesses
and maybe i forgive,
maybe she is laughing
and maybe i laugh inside her laughter
as its arms trace round my neck,
maybe i am a violin at four a.m.
spitting sorrow at the walls
or maybe we forget these things
and drown within the wine
and drown beneath the sheets.

-S.C. Martinez