Can you wolf-whistle Dixie
with your fangs sunk deep
in the South?

A mouth full of fur and grits
stuffs my howl with mumbling
yes ma’am, no ma’am

as the house blew down
when my Grandfather’s heart
huffed and puffed its last,

my Grandmother
red riding hoodwinked
into the woods of East Tennessee,

Southern Gothic from before Grimm
hunts down the False Grandmother –
La Finta Nonna –

where the wolf leaves
the Grandmother’s blood and meat
for the girl to eat

and says remove her clothing
and toss it into the fire,
but it’s a boy this time, it’s me

riding shotgun
where the dirt road narrowed
to two ruts by the bend in the river,

an animal stalking
the words for rage,
holding perfectly still

like morning mist
in the bottom
of the holler.

For The Sunday Muse

Boyo, you haven’t taken off your boots
in a week or brushed your teeth –
my son the Jack of Knives – you stutter Instagram
accounts of theft – how you cut blue
from black out of the night
and hid in the Dunkin Donuts until 3AM
when the police finally were gone,
the color drained from the face of the cashier
because he knew, he knew.

I heart you from safety
where I am not father to the chicken tenders
hardening under your bed –
can’t you manage *both* art and hygiene?
Do you have to put your camera
in my face, the shutter flicking open like the click
of a switchblade, mugging before the lens?
We scuffle about your overdrafts, my insistence
you return the stolen colors in your pocket.

For The Sunday Muse