The Money Shot
Ricardo Maldonado
persists as penalty asked for, as case of oneself to another is resurrected with coffee,
except he blessed day break and he has seen my face fear the end because he
prayed
it wouldn’t
be safe to place a name for it, when the Marlboros were tossed because they
implicated
expiration at year’s end,
because he neglected the access select/start and the boroughs exist
if marked by limit—if there is limit—if he would comprehend there was much to
endorse
inside the walk-up, when I read without mercy.
Must be every city exists if the limit could tame the earth, if the limit could fail but
breed
excuses to ensure a kind of heresy and be more of a result of meaning
when he walked to the door, without mystery.
At least we could refuse the name because we made residence and means
to wait, because the express left and the first penalty, at eleven, was called our
exile.
Ricardo Alberto Maldonado was born and raised in Puerto Rico. His poems and translations have appeared in Boston Review, DIAGRAM, Sidebrow, and Guernica. A recipient of fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts and Queer/Arts/Mentorship, he is the Managing Director of the 92Y Unterberg Poetry Center.
