The Angio

My father lies at the end of my white coat,

witnessing his own angiography. He jokes,

winces occasionally. The techs are reading

Malcolm X. Two vein grafts are

occluded. The internal mammary artery graft

looks good in many different projections. In

this decade, we are redirected towards the

mammary, for our hearts' blood. It

strikes me that my father has no grandchildren.

A patient of mine had his coronaries done for the

third time with a graft from his gastric artery.

Truly, the way to a man's heart...

ha ha... We have bitten of the heart and the

heart is The Tree. The serpent recoils post-op.

Not one of us is ready for the next exposure.

I did not want to

The Angio

My father lies at the end of my white coat,

witnessing his own angiography. He jokes,

winces occasionally. The techs are reading

Malcolm X. Two vein grafts are

occluded. The internal mammary artery graft

looks good in many different projections. In

this decade, we are redirected towards the

mammary, for our hearts' blood. It

strikes me that my father has no grandchildren.

A patient of mine had his coronaries done for the

third time with a graft from his gastric artery.

Truly, the way to a man's heart...

ha ha... We have bitten of the heart and the

heart is The Tree. The serpent recoils post-op.

Not one of us is ready for the next exposure.

I did not want to

bring him here, because I did not want him to

know how easily he fits into my pocket, and

to what lengths I'll go to keep him there. My

father observed the

autopsy of his father, who walked around Miami

for a week with a massive coronary occlusion,

and he can— my fingers at his temples,

holding all I ever need

to be— watch steadily as the

dye, serpentine, drips

down the screen.

Another Drive-by

Drive-by birth— this mother snares a cab,

Shoots up, delivers, leaves her baggage

Back-seat to the world—boy born, tab

Unpaid. The driver hasn't disengaged

The gears. Paramedics cut the cord.

The taxi twitches, swears, then, disappears.

Sirens swaddle them and us in sordid

City night. Small body in arrears

For drugs, drugs lace a smile across a face

Devoid of motherhood, numb to need.

She nearly rolls onto him, takes his place.

We take her in to detox, warm, to feed

A son. Withdrawal fuels a newborn thirst.

Milky, dawn suckles day by dying first.