The Green Bottle

Moon of tinted glass,

how you pierce the throat of night.

The hibiscus trees weep poison.

They weep poison.

*

In the yard, crows circle

an empty chair where my father sat.

His shadow drinks from red rivers,

rivers that flow nowhere but down.

*

The crickets know my name.

They scrape it against their legs

while K-9s urinate on the rosemary leaves,

dry and yellow in morning light.

*

Three glasses stand like eucalyptus trees.

Three graves of crystal.

My father's voice shook

like wind-torn leaves.

Like wind-torn leaves.

*

The moon fills each glass with the nectar,

with memory, with thorns.

Below consciousness, a river flows.

Red river. River of thorns.

River of no return.