I was five that summer, in our new house, with the light
aproning over the desert just before dark. That year I touched the blue
pink skin of my cousin’s baby rabbits in the smoky evening smell
of El Paso lawns. And there’s Hulia watching me, her head positioned,
great and toothless, through the broken window; the first big boney fish
star of the wrinkled sky. And there’s my mother and father’s bed.

It was one of those standard, posture-correct, kingsize beds
preferred by newly married couples in the 60s along with avocado light
fixtures. Tiki Torches and furniture store paintings of Picassoesque fish
that glared over the matching carpet where I’d dance the lovesick blues
with my Uncle Mitch. He’d play Hank Williams in the den and then position
me on his boots, my face pressed against his jeans that smelled