EIGHTEEN

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ROYA SHAMS / MOM

1963–1988

fuck a falling bird metaphor, respectfully,

simple pity and scolding trills too, the asphyxiating

performance of okayness today

sharpened enough to slice an anvil in two,

neither slumbering nor sleeping,

no second-person-singular here, no plotless

evocation of pain shivering the lavender;

here where men fight about justice

like a drowning boy trying to pull himself

out of a river by his own hair—

ruby dropped in an open grave, my old dealer’s

Zulfiqar tattoo—also ugly, time spilling

over, unbearable actually, and pestilent,

a thing remaining this wrong forever

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—from BOOKOFMARTYRS.docx by Cyrus Shams