Rebecca Zweig
only speaking with worn codes I
divine hospitality from hostage my landlord
exposed by which I mean teased
into light watching me from behind the curtains I
keep open through the night watching my neighbor’s
television through the night my neighbor watching the bachelor
into the dawn that holds my rose attentions now
wilting my landlord hot in the purple
hydrangeas refusing the flattened
new light assigned by encroaching
developments flattening the crocuses the hostas my landlord
beyond the curtain digging them up in sad music
the music sings only the lonely my landlord the
codes worn most efficiently in music
Modern Country
Johnny sends a video
of a fish bellied up
its expression torn loose in the lake
where we swim &
swim each night
of summer I touch the porcelain
white lesion on my back we
don’t know what causes the tissue to break
down they said might
be genetics
you Ashkenazis have so
many problems returning
from the water Graham applies the seven
hundred dollar
topical steroid
like a pro apologizes
for the pain when I double
over with its
burning Rhinestone
Cowboy in every bar
since Glen Campbell died last
week one last lucid thought of modern
country it’s just
shit EDM
about drinking beer he said
& trap beats thrown thoughtless
at some excess myth in Yakima
Rachael turns up
Eric Church to drown
out the scabland collapse
as it dissolves
into the brassy angular light of
wildfire
we still swim the night
after Johnny’s video can’t
take the heat then rain then again the heat
& besides we’ve already decided we’re
not having kids
we swim too close
to the Gates’ estate where the guards
in ill-fit khaki barely
concealing their carry
run to us
to protect the deep
thick of nothing where
my admiration betrays me as smoke
descends Carrie Underwood says backroad backroad again escaping
enclosure Kathy points
to me in streetlight “that
thing on your back
it’s so white it almost looks
expensive” ticking our wet
on the cement beach
Rebecca Zweig is a writer, reporter and filmmaker based in Mexico City.