Six quatrains for the cops who beat me

--for Marcus Benner and Richard Lilliard

The reason for my peace
Sneaks forward
Like a ten-year-old kid in the grass
Trying to catch bees.

We pass this way and that.
The woman with a womb
Like a fire is waiting for me
To come to bed.

The cool sheet was like a dream
After I was beaten. I lay soaking
On a gurney, like a wet clay figurine
Shit out by god. When I tasted my blood

I knew I was god. The sound
In my head was of a thousand
Hives honeycombed by the angriest
Of bees. And the gringo doctors

Circled this and that, what
They wanted to remove. Curled
On the edge was me, what was left
Of my soul, the deep hole

Those men had left in me. Still,
I have no anger. Every morning
I wake to kiss my son, I wake
To kiss my daughter.