after Robert Kloss

Missing someone is a blood spattered top hat
so gradually I go out looking more terrible.
I become the last one’s way with women, with
men I kiss in parking lots. Please keep me from
kissing men without major psychiatric illnesses
in parking lots. I will be good. I will wear a flannel
nightgown and pad pregnant across our floor.

Missing someone is an alligator
and I always preferred alligators over crocodiles.
They have dog snouts. I knew I loved you
when you called and I was crying on those motel
stairs in Mississippi. You called me Sis. I say let us be
black blood and bolt guns, bellies and pie. Protect us.
Any kind of future is a reptile, really.

Donora Hillard reads her poem here: 2012-11-13 03_31
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Donora Hillard is the author of the poetry collections Theology of the Body (Gold Wake Press, 2010) and Covenant (with Zachary C. Bush, Gold Wake Press, 2012) as well as several poetry/hybrid text chapbooks. Her projects have been featured by Chicago Public Radio, CNN, Lybba, MSNBC, and the Poetry Foundation. She lives in Detroit.