Lester Petillo is a poet living in New York City.
Eight
a twin in a town of dumpster
sculptures. i walked feverishly toward
him and made acquaintance. he was deeply
restless like trees in the night wind.
we rode the subway and related our troubles.
is this redundant? he asked in his home, slapping
the flat of the kitchen knife on his thigh.
no, i told him. and right then we felt it:
what we’d been meaning for, been wanting,
the need to get out, to go, for having
dazed away so many days through fear
and waiting.
and we did go, walking and around, outside.
left the knife, but we shoulda
brought it he chided a few times;
all the real people we found in the streets
got us scared and sorry and
wrestled us out of it.
brought ourselves back to the house,
took that knife in both our palms
and cut up all his ma’s walls. the paper,
rolled and hanging down, went colorless.
when his ma got home her face lost color too.
all i could see was him and me and we
made it seem, to her, that we ran
off, away. but didn’t and spent a night in
his attic, talking restless over great fears of
missing our own reasoning for doing such things.
soon, i began to feel the dream of it:
the shifting time and his shifting faces.
in life, i have no friends like this.
Clementine Unbound 