There are little white pills     lodged in my throat

bitter.                  Flushed down by the stories of your youth like

the one where your mother shot herself                 twice. The first one didn’t work.           

                                   That bitch, you say.

Or, the one where the man with the gun cried in your arms for what

he did. Told you to run with him.      War

cradled you two but someone’s son is dead.

Try again, to drown yourself.

Vodka and painkillers, unwrap your numb legs, with a side of

silence — and they are after you again.

In the sky.     Bat in hand held firmly against

your sons and the mountains are not too far           there you’ll be born again,

Your mother is calling you.