POLICE OFFICER CONVICTED OF KILLING GAY LOVER
—CNN, MAY 2005.
: Verb, to be sawtoothed. For three jagged trenches
to be the throat’s lasting legacy. To let morning
enter the body like a man’s appendage; come
dawn, an encore—sweet voyeur, the blushing
sky. To let the nameless cop enter
the apartment. And Jesse. And Jesse. To speak
without words to the man who has not a name
but a body. To whisper hello until the moon drops
back into the barrel of blue hills. To leave
even trenches raked in the throat, to be
Columbia, Missouri’s worst case
in years. To be a body the rain
can’t take back into its mouth, a queer boy
the sky can’t erase.
—for Jesse Valencia (1981-2004)