Anticipate

(for Rosa Pazos, Duana Johnson,
Michelle Carrasco, Amanda Milan,
Angie Zapata, and hundreds of others)

Maybe
you'll tell all
your friends that you
are going to get
murdered, maybe
you'll be right

Maybe
it will be a
bullet on a dark
street, a low-key
assassination
for not shutting up

Maybe your empty
flesh gets tossed
by the side of the
road like trash
and the first name
they give it
is "whore"

Maybe cabbies clap
while you bleed
out, maybe
your boyfriend
breaks your skull
and calls
you "it"

and a jury's asked
if maybe
he had a point and you
made your choice
when you demanded
a name. Maybe it's
what you wanted -- why

else would you walk
alone in this world
where you are not
welcome, where you barely
even exist? You were almost

a ghost already. Now you fit.


[from the upcoming collection The Eye Saw]