I grew up with the Chicks on cassette 

before they dropped their Dixie

howled Goodbye to Earl down Route 66

on the way to school each morning 

imagining how I would hide bodies

in the murk of silty lake water at camp 

or poison the beans of my lunchroom enemies

these days I conduct my historic plots 

wine drunk in my living room 

wearing a pink bathrobe and slippers 

NPR crackles loudly from a Zenith radio cabinet

found on Facebook marketplace 

I’m screaming Chappell Roan at my dogs

who are entirely unamused but

the neighbors across the street 

love the show

I go to bed with my feet dirty and do nothing 

all summer but wait for myself

to become myself again 

I wonder how moral it is to birth children 

into a hot world like ours 

sometimes I hear my mother screaming 

down the long hallway demanding 

that I wash my feet before I get into bed

under covers already I’d quickly put on socks

to hide the fact that I had tracked dirt in 

from digging small graves 

across the neighborhood 

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