Juan Luis Guzmán

Editor’s note: for mobile users, this poem is best viewed in landscape mode.

Cabro cabrito
cabrón, you give good guilt. You make of me
something wild. Cabro cabrón.

this animal in me

Cabrito,
you hold power over me like carcass
between lips, a kill not meant for feast.

release this animal-release in me

Cabrito cabrón
treading on the clever goat-feet
my grandmother warned about.

Diablito. Secret keeper. I signed your book.
Teeth cage my tongue from slipping.

this animal

In your eye, you hold
the sweetest meat; in your cheek
you’ve sewn away my taste.

release me