"noir city heat"

"noir city heat"
a poem of diabolical implications by jake kilroy.

i wrote poem after poem about you
with sweat beads dotting the eyes
and lips sounding out letters like smoke rings.

one night, i imagined
my teeth were ivory stumps,
sold to merchant ships
and given to lovers
as necklaces
after the
man they
loved
cheated
and
got caught.

the heat skulked around the house like a banshee,
and i barely dressed in anything respectable,
just waiting for death to show up with junk mail.

i marked my own skin like celtic illustrations
and watched the sun rise at night.
toothpicks gutted my gums
and the fan rolled around like a dying man.

the music got in my nerves then
and shook my bones
like waves against a prison.

my brow was bad architecture,
unevenly built in the graveyard,
but when i winked...
all hell broke loose.