Not My Sin

I am lost in the iambs
of your sonnets.
One syllable
after another,
each reads like the melody
you hummed
and thrummed
on your broken guitar
that summer of rain
and captivity.

I was caged in the places
of your poems
when it rained in our old city
and water
flowed into the crevices
of cement front yards.
Earthworms stealthily
crawled out of soil,
slimy, blind, defenseless.
Prisoner of
your saccharine voice,
your cayenne words,
I killed them all
slowly
with coarse grains of
kosher salt.

I hear it rained today
in our old city,
and the concrete is
water-washed once more.
I have killed so many
for you,
and you are still playing
that wretched broken guitar…
still reciting poetry
(I am lost in each iamb)…
still singing ballads
(that melody again)…

What would you have of me?
Very well,
I shall fill the salt shaker
to its brim.