Louie Leyson
yes i tried the apple cider vinegar,
the bottle of rosé left uncorked
by the sink, plates of day-old orange
juice balanced on the toilet tank, open jars
of honey, browned apricot flesh, bleach
on all the mirrors, wiped the garbage can
clean, dunked paper towels pinched
with larvae into half-done cups
of mcdonald's sprite—but nothing
comes close to the wrath
of my tsinelas, vengeful rubber
angels swooping faster
than their wings, small bodies
falling dead onto the windowsill
& swept. late september spent
just like every frantic summer
bursting with the slap of my mother's
tsinelas, undoing each buzzing
hour, each bulbous, sticky eye
& all their waking redness. cutting
short 8 days to live after 8 days
asleep inside of rooms the shape
of rice grains. another fly born
for every hour of summer. 18 flies
born for the knife that opened
my mother, gloved hands slicked
with womb blood unwinding
the soft of umbilical cord jelly
from a softer neck. so much
under the sun but nothing
more beautiful than black shapes
of reckoning: ants on the floor, spiders
on the ceiling, flies by the mangoes
she threaded with silver, gluttonous
but alive, brief but without startle.