Under the Empire

he looks at me for the misery he must get rid of.

he soughs as if draining a sewer, sits on the floor, all weight resting on one knee 

after praying, his body outlines a misty cave in cigarette smoke.

he deprives me of air.

he lives in this poem, but spends most of his time in the obstacles of self-hatred. 

he uses my mornings to question why our migrant life is a handcuffed beast. 

he asks the sand ripples in my face will it ever make sense without letting me answer him.

he always praises a comedian for finding something farcical about women with trans history,

which by his repetitive expression becomes a way to build a relationship 

between laughter and the kind of difference that cruelty destroys. 

he dangles in the ambition to be happy like a dark brown leaf in the beginning of winter.

he sees me writing I will drink water out the mouth of a fish-headed lion 

with its face to the sky in my own kingdom. he thinks of home 

as where i rest and do nothing. he is quiet most of the time. 

he puts a gun to my daydream and ingredients of the dish he wants to eat in the kitchen. 

he thinks sometimes when he remembers his father that death is the worst of all. 

he is wrong, death is not the worst possibility. 

he has steadily transformed the largest part of my little world into a death row 

by, in his own words, not trying to be mean to anyone. 

i don’t know where he got the idea that violence doesn’t make the body less human. 

he expects me to understand him.

he doesn’t hit me anymore, no more physical assault as he promised.

he tells whoever listens i’m not the kind of body that will finish climbing a mountain. 

he words about the rock grains in the rice i cooked as if they are eyes of rats in snow.

he pours water on his cup, glugging into the sound of my heart.

he stops me from wanting to eat more just by looking at the slum in my eyes.

he notices that i have too much hair fall and asks for tea. 

he fights with his manager in his head, whirrs fucktard cursed forever,

you just will never know what I know like a drone.

he would insist doing that was not a choice if i told him there was another gay man

killed by strangulation. 

he is the paradise that i starve for.

he chains a hungry dog below my chin and coats his body with the smell of gizzard.  

do you honestly love me, if i asked him, yes or no, 

he would tell me why do you bring so much negativity?

he wants to know my prayer. 

he invents my prayer and jokes about sucking his dick instead.

he finds out, through his doctor’s message, he might need his liver reshaped later 

and i fall asleep because i’m tired of wanting miracles.

he wakes in the quietest time to pee, passes by me sleeping on the couch 

trying to look at the escape door without it looking back at me.