I am burning up in Hell’s Kitchen,
replete with singed hair, fire trucks
scream bloody blue murder…
I am thinking of a man again.
I don’t do well in solitary confinement
& acts of violence leave me bored these days.
I am wearing fitted leather driving gloves which
wrap so nicely around a certain shape of throat,
and no fingerprints. I am marked.

4:11 on a Sunday as I attempt to be glib.
I have an envelope with instructions in my briefcase.
He called me on the phone late last night.
His voice was the texture of Napoleon brandy.
He used to say that making love to me was celestial.
He didn’t see the killer – for that I tried to hate him.

My skin is slick with sweat, and now I know
how Joan of Arc felt, with rapturous thoughts
of God & redemption
& ignited desire.

– Andrea Grant