Cloud, at the party, you wouldn’t take off your buster sword and I get it, I do | Nicole Oquendo

At the party, you wouldn’t take off your buster sword and I get it, I do

because I too am ready for anything, in the way years 

of garage doors creaking with the sun about to rise

and glass breaking irregular and spreading

become status effects that can’t be cured

we’ve both waited for monsters to die 

and have been unable to elaborate

and speaking of monsters, 

what a casual way to unname what hurts us 

while the music plays inside us

while we imagine swinging swords above our heads to the boom of a trumpet

rather than be burdened by our last names

so of course you want to be the hero of this party,

leaning back as if what hurts you isn’t alive and creeping

in the bestiary, inside your heart,

reborn always from a sharp noise, but aren’t they all

pointed now, I understand.

Nicole Oquendo’s poetry and prose is out in the form of a hybrid memoir and six chapbooks, including their most recent work, The Antichrist and I (Bone & Ink Press). Their full-length visual poetry collection we, animals will be released by Beating Windward Press in 2021. In the meantime, follow them on Twitter @nicoleoq and at nicoleoquendo.com.