The Wake

She smiles softly, shyly
lolling eye to ground to me to ground
to me,
her lifted heel turned out edge to toe,
to ground,
to rock her body slowly.
“Want to go to fuck?” she says
in broken English, wordless,
on the tip of her tongue
the words mean nothing,
teeth diagonaled in their gums, the scent of blood
behind them,
blood in sheets,
cold spit-laced sheets.

I ask how much, and secretly gasp…
the easiness of words,
“Twenty fuck and ten for room” she says.
“Thirty all. All for thirty,”
turning, I look down to smile,
to warm and blush,
to say yes alone, to reap away
the comfort
of those words.
“Another night,” I say
to her not-understanding face
expressed on
lips hung red,
eyes light and sweet.

“I need you,” I would say to her
another time and place,
between the soundlessness
of night
and what we didn’t have to say,
but understood.
I leave her standing there,
and turn my head to the newspaper wind,
to the cigarette smoke
on the palms of the trees,
oh girl, mi joven, mi amor,
decir, mirar, torcer, dormir,
I wouldn’t pay you if I could,
but I am more alone than you.

I lie in the bathtub, naked, white as the cold sink,
trout-eyed water-falling tile floor silence.
The hotel is empty,
the night is too long.
I think of the way
she was lit by the lamplight.
I think of the words on her lips,
too young, too young,
I take time to close up my eyes.
I take more than only time,
I listen…..
for the shift of her shoe on the turn,
for the comforting crack
of her crooked-tooth smile.