My youngest son is handling guns. He slides his delicate fingers,
his palm, sometimes his still stubbleless cheek along the metal barrel.
I know he does this daily in his new military life of hair shirts and
the narrowed eye perhaps only I remember. You were like that,
old friend, in your own hair shirt guarding the 144 rifles under the bed
you would later tell Shondu we only fucked on, fearful of the scent
of any surrender and the way the lingering of your palm on my
belly flesh made you cry. Or so I remember you that morning when your
nine doberman pinschers smelled you on the edge of flying up and out
the musty basement window down Waldeck Street, beyond
Dudley Street Station, and circled the bed. I hope my son never has dogs.
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