Teen Angel



That year, everyone had your same name,
but spelled it with an "S". Black beauties

in baggies at the bottom of your purse.
A 28-year-old boyfriend. Your whispers

that my bangs made me look retarded.
I watched you break the mirror in your

locker with your hands, then stare at
the tiny blood like it was something

new. Drunk in the backseat of my car
on the way to a party. A handful of aspirin.

Some kind of song, that summer, with your
name over and over. I never knew how to

look at you, quite, one eye fixed just
a finger's breadth to the left of the other.

Dopesick Angel


The bedsheets he uses to cover his
windows chatter in the wind, I watch

the stains on their edges move
into formation, grow wings. I imagine

what she saw just before the Mustang
struck her, I see her trying to raise her

hand to cover her eyes. He said he kissed
me because the mole next to my eye

reminded him of her, although she
didn't have any moles, and was much

softer and easier to touch. I touch
his crown as he's sleeping; I rub

the plastic edges, peel the stick-on
bunnies off the inner rim.