Sex and Murder Magazine

By Michelle Tookerjitsu is useless now—
sensei didn’t mention hands
of neighborhood boys
curling around necks
after a brisk hello at the fence.

Who could grapple with surprise
that erupts like arctic air?
Or make use of limbs too small to armlock
a boy’s two-hundred pounds?

As oxygen elopes with CO2
I remember:
the barn bonfire that swallowed Hurley,
the thundersnow, blueberries in July,
Denny at my brother’s tenth birthday party.
Here’s a present for Ben.
And I didn’t see it then, his snakelike
smile that said I watch you.

He’s watching now,
as rosettes coat my eyes
in the way termites descend on
wingless friends.