Phone, keys, wallet, notebook, grief. Empty out
my pockets & still, it spills onto the floor.
Grief clouds my contacts, throws static
through my Shokz. Skyler drives out to
the desert looking for his mother & there, grief
lies coiled like a snake. Grief in these
DMs of Gazan mothers begging me for change.
Grief in our Guisado’s, grief in masked fascists
hooding heads in black. I grieve my Daoist-Byron
brother & imagine him at my side.
Grief waiting stinger-ready in my boot toes,
perched owl-like atop my chest. In time,
I learn to whistle & when grief comes bounding over like
a hungered hound, I wipe my eyes & I hold out my hand.