in the waiting room i confess my sins: flyering, some shouting.
on wednesday, i laughed and showed all my teeth.
on thursday, i sat beneath a cloud of cigarette smoke,
knelt in the dirt with my friends, wishing on the herbs
and looked doe-eyed at everyone around me.
i could tell you that the empire rejects me, but i linger in the arms of men
and wish to be saved. moreover,
my body won’t hold the weight of it—it demands i stand upright but i crumple
to the ground on the sidewalk, in the street, on the bus in my sturdy boots. 

the doctor asks what can be done for me.
what, i ask, can be done for any of us.
he prescribes an inhaler, a painkiller, ten hail marys. 

i ask what about love and he shines a light down my throat.
i ask about love and he taps at my knee, looks me in the eye, points again at my mouth. 

is the pain here, he asks. 

everywhere, i say.
my friends long to go home and the longing is the pillar that keeps them upright.
day and night they murmur it quietly, shout it loud, plant it lovingly in the soil.
an act of repetition against forgetting, a prayer for a future full of sprouting hope.
me, i want a home that won’t devour me.
i want no more endless wars, i want to grow green tomatoes
and fry them in the summer. 

the doctor steps back, eyes glittering like Xangô.
you want a revolution, he says.
i want, i say, no one to be sick—my friends curled over with grief and me,
wilting at the altar.