LEON MCALLISTER

Nerve Agent

girls who pack deep wounds with candy floss
girls who cross the equator with no guns on their belt

couples arguing about sex
together on the glider in solar pastures
spreading honey thin over corrugated plains
you can see the field and the sun past the razor wire

we were alligators in New York sewer
splashing in puddles of hot kiss body spray
crouching on plastered shelves across the causeway
we were spiritual successors holding on to live animals

where will we go when the sun burns out?
splashing and seizing in pools of crop-drowning motor oil
hibernating beneath the earth’s surface in decorative caskets
abhorrent animals run together
clumsy love you can hear

girls paddle board on plastic waters in some blinding place
girls wearing white coats will scrape at your insides

her head on your shoulder
together on the glider in solar pastures
her hand crushing the bones in your hand
ancient and pricking like poison-tipped puffer fish spines
her tetrodotoxin renders you melted and silent
tectonic plates crashing together forever

girls who run circles around the sun
girls who walk backwards toward Valhalla
girls wear masks of hammered gold underground