above all we know that no one
sees monsters & gods
more perfectly than children 

orange rind september dusk 
& the ghost cicada chorus of dead summer

i sat in the tall grass with the
May brothers & Tommy Hyer from
two blocks over

i wouldn't be born for
another forty-four years 

i practiced the bildungsroman 
with them

between broken pine tree branches
& yellow-faced pitcher plants
the flatwoods mistook us for
its long lost sons

turned into brush fire years ago

catching red-bellied salamanders
Eddy Mays had poured his mother's
raspberry jam out on the side of
road to use the mason jar to hold them

their skin car-hood glossy 
& eye balls as inside-out stars

wasn't it three children 
who saw the virgin of guadalupe 
& fatima?

are all monsters virgins
more or less?

some with snake heads to stand on

on the edge of farmer Bailey's
cattle fields you rose up

the brothers would recall you
surrounded by mist as thick
& green as cucumber skin

Tommy would say he swore the
fog was grey like his nana's long
church going-skirts

i could only see your 
red piercing eyes-- the cowl
like a halo behind your head

what makes a body in human?

why do so many monsters find
themselves like this? with irises
the color of salamander skin
& tail lights?

did you mean to choose us then?

trusting young boys with
your dark figure

did you imagine we might talk
there for awhile?

i'm sorry i ran from you

i am forty-four years 
older now & i wanted to tell
you that i would stay if
you came to find me now

you would like pennsylvania
& the corn fields hide foxes to
keep you company 

i would feed them watermelon
rinds in late august when 
i felt alone

i didn't visit the neighborhood
boys after that

but i watched the sherif search
the earth for remnants of visit

his flash light like a butter knife
through the dark

they'd find skid marks:
evidence of your space craft
or was it a time machine?

you don't have to tell me 
i'm only here to say that i
believe you & your anatomy 

some say you could have been
a barn owl but i talked to the
barn owls-- they say 
that humans often look for
comfortable explanations 

for bodies they don't want to understand