Nighttrains

When i blow open green bottles
straight across hump of a frozen tongue

when i shove brown glass
through skull of a possum
and pass from my ears a baptism of red piss

when i cry from my butt like a jackal
and throw limbs of a dying mule into the river

when i spit venom from the head
burn codeine into a cosmetic paste
and grieve into a wax of dried bulls

when my mystical bunions jam eyes
into searching spit of a starving wolf
into cosmic lips like monkey genitals

And i receive my pickled turned skeleton of rusty chains
in the bodega
i receive a symbolic heart made of five middle fingers
in the bodega
i receive a teeth parade of yellow roses to leave the bodega
and cross the rio grande
onto the flatbead bones of a musty nighttrain

I say
to see me loosen jaws like a snake
to see me exhausted after a few strikes
to see me pay dirt to the ice hog
in my masai-pachuca-doo
squatting on a pillow of old zoot suits
squatting among the names and breeds
breaking down cheeks dotted
on this night train
and i say i dream of the 1943 riots
I say i dream in a hailstorm of riots
And i say riots dream into a mass of skins stooping
on flatbed bones of a funky nighttrain

And when i siphon sweat for fuel
from this patron saint of chronic diarrhea

When i turn this rubber face into a spotted puma
and take on the forceful winds of the prune pickers

When my laughter dominates the last seat
And i burn labor contracts into brown port caca

Then I approach in mother of pearl and human blood
in father of smoking and coughing throats
and in my jelly of coyote strings
who is to say what when i approach

I mean somewhere along the road in this cold cold chicken shit
somewhere along the road in this wasted body
​somewhere along the road eat stocks, bonds feathers
​somewhere along the road confiscate borders from wild dogs
​somewhere along the road shove them into the imperial valley
​somewhere along the road cry hard
and let this night train sink its
rundown rectum of electric chairs into heaven
and say fuck it

I see a way through the maroon glass of this milky way
I say i see a way through for the cradle of hulls
sticking through these indigo ankles
I see a way through
for these torn shoes stinking like dead cats
I see a way through for these blood-streaked legs
I say i see a way through
for these pus-riddled holes in their suction-cup lips
and when i pass through toothless combs coming from armpits
of the bodega
when i pass through bats on corkscrews coming
from the bodega
when i push my mortified flesh from this bodega
and walk with the mildew of an old zoot suit
walk tall in my mud-packed-masai-pachuca-doo
walk among the survivors from the musty nighttrains
fuck it
I say dreams are like riots
i say we dream in a hailstorm of riots
and I say riots dream into a mass of skins
coming from flatbed bones of the funky funky nighttrains

Copyright Credit: Jayne Cortez, "Nighttrains" from On the Imperial Highway. Copyright © 2009 by Jayne Cortez. Reprinted by permission of Hanging Loose Press.
Source: On the Imperial Highway (Hanging Loose Press, 2009)