“Winged-Man & His Stars”
For H
Stripped-down where our holy spaces filled with ants.
I’m ripe & thinking of the first time someone fucked me.
Blades supplemental hot-iron wings silver-slicked down my back
I’m hungering here nested in the backseat of his cobalt.
Soft clay forms spot sticky with newness so much newness white & impure
Not saintly he tells me god does not exist pay attention to the stars.
I’ll float & drift within his silver-slicked push—take & give.
I enter his indifference unwanted but satiated we last three years
Before my flesh pulses with memory flying above & under him.
He talked about cosmic intent whatever the fuck that meant
Cosmic intent super nova & its burst orange death/rebirth.
Black hole sucking & fucking a galaxy he studied chemistry in college
I studied his eyebrows how much he cried when we broke up
How much my mother loved him before she started loving me
& stars dead pulse bright dead pulse so much stars
In the sky that god did not create that’s what the winged-man said
When he unfurled his silver-slicked wings to cover me
to cover my eyes.
Mateo Lara is from Bakersfield, California. He received his B.A. in English at CSU Bakersfield. He is currently working on his M.F.A. in Poetry at Randolph College in Lynchburg, VA. His poems have been featured in Orpheus, EOAGH, Empty Mirror, and The New Engagement. He is an editor for RabidOak online literary journal.
