Liam Connors

Marlboro 27 solar flares expelled in the dark of the morning
Like strings of light decorating the walls of a loading dock

Bloodshot eyes in the frigid air of dawn
As sweat crystallizes into ice
As stale breath solidifies over battle strategies

Black coffee breaks down burnt empanadas
Prepared on a backyard lawn the evening prior
Carefully selected off the walls of the bodega-on-wheels

//

Bones splinter beneath the combined pressure 
Of machine and man

Who supped on sleep and broke their fast on bile
Who are numbers forgotten on the first and fifteenth
Who are brothers birthed in the beds of box trucks

//

Fifteen minutes of freedom 

OVER!

As the house of worship opens once more 
Calling decrepit dogs crawling back to the kennel
To kneel at their altar
To read words secondhand from The Book of Job.