March

Doris is proud to love the fall, proving her
hardy as a burr.
Her favorite food is the peanut, which,
when heavily roasted, tastes like bread
and wine and the ground. Her favorite bird
is the grackle, which looks like
an oil spill, hence like an oil spill
survivor. Her favorite grackle picks
pan dulce by the Hotel Antigua pool,
where white women preen their new
brown babies. ¡Que linda! Solo agua pura
para mí. Solo hamburguesa para él.

Doris doesn't want a baby, she wants a bird
thick with petroleum. She wants a brawny
hippie man with a grackle on each shoulder
and despair buried in his right eye,
craving in the left.

Let me bring you a towel, my dirty sweet,
she would say. Let me spoon warm brown
nuts into you. ¡Que linda! Solo
una nueva vida para mí.