The kid had no brothers or toys. He had his own
two hands and a pair of cheap cotton gloves
that couldn't keep out the cold. All day I watched
his shadow load for him uppercuts as carefully
as a bottle rocket. Furious hooks he whipped
like boomerangs through the air between our heads
and always they came back to the place where
they began. To me a fist was just a palm filled with
fingertips - a punch just a poor man's baseball bat -
but the kid would laugh through his nose while working
on his swing in the mirror. By accident once he put

the goalie
of a good team, i talked
to my net.

"today, at recess,
i heard the girl with black hair
who sits ahead of me two chairs
say to someone, about me, yes. that boy
is mine."

to the crossbar, i said

"from now on, everything
is going to be okay!" the sky, i know,
had clouds. my arms.

i was the goalie of
a good team, then. my glove opened once
to a beetle, the big kind

with the antlers, whose wings

i saw and stood. still
as a post.

had you been in the field,
would have seen the boy. he was
a head and some neck sticking out. maximos
is the name the boy gave to himself. max,
who collects. who has hair that moves
with the field. next to the toes of the boy
was the machine that he made: a caterpillar
waited on a loose wing of duct tape. max
the collector listened to the ground and
wanted to howl. it cost his whole
skeleton to lift the machine.

had you been in the field,
would have seen a boy argue
with a box. would have heard a new
born screaming inside. herd not a snake: the sky

real drug users don’t brag about their addictions. cyndi says. and sips her coffee.

i frown. my left eye pops like
the sun will someday pop. um

yeah? i ask.

yeah. i answer.

yeah! i reaffirm. absolutely.

for awhile, we listen to her
hair fall out. i am
trying to remember. something
in my shoes.
i notice
she has just begun to finish
that sip. that same sip. that was
a long sip. my
goodness
gracious.

her head is turning.
real drug users don’t write faggy poems glorifying the lifestyle.

yeah. i nod. my fingers, at this moment,

hullo my name is magic kant. i am
gorgeous but i have a shitty person
Al it tea. i set

cars on fire and vomit
after meals do you
believe in god? one time

i broke my pinky finger on a four
head but didn't realize it till the swelling died
and it was too late. now the finger is
perm man nent lee crook
Ed but that's all o.k i like it more now.

i have brown eyes & accurate
pee. you wanna go see a movie? i've
noticed i've been clenching my teeth
a lot. i don't like

talking about art so much because
what a waste of art so

how tall can you jump? most people
like me