​
​SMALL VIOLENCE
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​

I didn’t know of the music of bricks
being raked and carted
in a wheelbarrow—

their kiln-bodies colliding in
holy dust,
like a family of red munias

fleeing from a burning tree—
such a long panic of
passerine pseep.

In winter, when
out of the force of habit,
I rip some dry skin from

the chapped borders of my lips—
I breed a long, pure line
of blood from the violence

of these small hands
and call it
a country.