I could spend the weekend in the hospital.
The way Mami did. The way Marilyn does.
I could spend the weekend waiting for a man to love me back.
I could spend the weekend fucking up the revolution.
I could spend the weekend inside of the moon.
I could spend the weekend eating my regret.
I could spend the weekend removing clichés from my suicide note.
I could spend the weekend fucking someone's husband.
I could spend the weekend ignoring my children less.

Marilyn got tired of people
forgetting her name
so she decorated her neck with it.

The doctors have asked us to stop
funding her addiction to Nyquil.

I think of all of the times I am forced
to lie awake with my madness.

Mami is concerned
only with the cost of prayer.

I reassure her that God is still God even when he is a woman.
I reassure her that God is still God even when I am not her daughter.
I reassure her that God is still God even when her demons are church.
I reassure her that God is still God even when my father was not.

Last weekend I go to a gay bar. I ask for a lap dance
from the boy with the island tongue. Puerto Rico
and all of its debt poured from his mouth
and into my wanting hands. The boy is a deficit for me.
I am not allowed in the back room. Twenty Dollars
and he will risk his god for me. I spend my rent money
choosing a mouth to reduce to charcoal. We travel to
the darkest corner and the room dances like a pill
on the tongue.