Skull, knuckle
When I received people
it felt normal
no worse than footage
of a python
regurgitating a baby
hippopotamus.
Cemetery: the place
you’re spewed
the cold throat
you crawl down.
That’s when I asked
for medicine
received a secret bottle
a good person
could fill with plumes
of soft whispers.
All caskets share
a special key—
the slurp
of a drunken kiss
between those
not meant
for each other, a final
keep-quiet meet-up—
each body arrives
wrapped in similar plastic
which clings to the face,
same death-sweat
subtle smell:
a single bouquet
of far-off
ambrosia.
Every urn transported in
the same canvas tote.
What a dense and strange
horizon, a cold
and wild wonder.
Stitched finger
plucks the feathered
heirloom lyre.
The sun tends
to rage down on a family
when who they could touch
is sealed under soil.
poems by nicholas alti 