joker.

one. who jokes (what do you take me for)
two. deceptive clause (claws?), as in a contract
three. extra playing cards
used in some games
(i aint playin no )

confronting an old self

there are rooms and borders. same goes for defenses.

don't feel entitled to anything you didn’t sweat and struggle for.
the coefficients b1 and b2 depend on the elasticity of substitution
including
yourself. because if you are not constantly attempting
to achieve equilibrium, some kind of internal and external
(intrinsically linked) balance, you are a doomed dinosaur. you are
a beautiful creature, but doomed. you are,
in such adaptive contexts,
assumed a contiguous whole.

sensitized and seeking
ethnocultural variations that match your own, a cultural way of thinking
that remains marginalized relative to other issues of theory and practice

remember what's passed.

looking right at a family portrait from some twenty years hence
reminds me of a time I wish I had, an era I feel I missed

by being born
in Amerika, an idea,
the other side of the fence--once it was an ocean, an adventure
across the llanos on a motorbike or a caballo
next to your uncle who in one hand holds a necklace of oxtail bones
to gift to the dona of the farm you are about to visit

having everything and nothing
to do with the you of this very minute
having been humbled by a ------ love
which means it's hard now
to adjust the collar
and smooth the hem of a misshapen relationship
which inadvertently expose the calves that remind you
of the mountains of your birth village

saying it out loud
helps stop the rhythm,
therefore ending the pattern.
your hem is already straight, or would be
if saying that would stop the perpetuation
of a binary, heteropatriarchal, sociolinguistic way
of looking at the world. perpetuation is only
one letter away from
perpetration.

what kind of reauthorization act is this.

an unplanned life has tremendous beauty; there is always
some surprise not knowing how far away the next is

unplanned even if in one hand you hold a necklace of oxtail bones
and if you can't help
but want to lean into the body
of the landscape
inhaling her scent
gifting her with a smooth hem.