r o b e r t o    m o n t e s

 
 

WHAT'S LOOSE IN THE DIRT GETS TO CRAWL AROUND


One way to be a person is to settle down and scream for help


One way to be a person is to call your family to your side








































WHAT'S LOOSE IN THE DIRT GETS TO CRAWL AROUND
 

My body is a temple
to how I will not die.
I will wear a headdress
made of famous towers
I have not visited.
I will slowly understand
what you mean
by the beach.
I will not take off my shirt
until there is no choice.
The moment when
things are loveliest.
The moment when
you quietly ask me
to take off my shirt
and we laugh
because I never
wear a shirt
not even now.
I am always lying
in small, helpful ways
to maximize morale
of the planet
while it works its face
into peculiar expressions.
Expressions I know best
when I accidentally feel
beautiful soaking
my forearm in the kitchen sink.
Expressions I will mouth
every night in my sleep.
And people will gather
in delicate orbit
to ask
please be silent
and I will not respond
as they watch my body
drift above their continent,
a satellite
that forgets every morning
why it never touches down.

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One way to be a person is to settle down and scream for help

—

People understand. The heart is a muscle. Maybe is a muscle. On the internet I was so shirtless and attractive. One cheek against a plain white tile and I make perfect sense. Congress holding something to your mouth. Letting go. I have a feeling love is what you tie around a plastic bag when you don't want a choice. It's yours now, congratulations. I am not a doctor but I believe taking my advice is a good way to build a bond. When your heart hurts it's not overuse. When you find the one they find a way underwater. That lake, like an only child, tries again and again to share with itself. Don't deny it. You'll make fools of us all.

  

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One way to be a person is to call your family to your side

—

Dumb is what is moving but does not know to stop. On the sheets, stupid with cancer, I was a thoughtless glass frosted over. Fuck the pancreas or its ability to change a few people's lives. I don't care. The rope didn't end it just got too thick to climb. I never learned Mandarin. I never wanted to learn Mandarin. My great idea is you could be reassuring all the time. It could be tax-deductible. And then everyone will hate the government. If you hate the government you probably enjoy really angry sex. A position on one thing is a position of another. What's the thing is what's important. Look at me going on without a blade of hope. On the internet my first reaction is to write death is dumb over and over. In the real world I feel the same. We have no choice we just keep growing. We answer yes when they ask us who to blame.

  

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ROBERTO MONTES's first collection, I DON'T KNOW DO YOU, is forthcoming from Ampersand Books in 2014. His chapbook, HOW TO BE SINCERE IN YOUR POETRY WORKSHOP, unfolded at http://napuniversityonline.com . His work has appeared in or is forthcoming from ILK, Interrupture, DEATH HUMS, The New Megaphone and elsewhere. He lives in Queens and reads poetry for Sixth Finch.


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