Darrell Dela Cruz

To Pick a Scab

is to love the contents that construct us
like the iron from the same framework.
How some specific genome connects

one form to another. A triumph of high
evolution: the denial of service when loading
a website which shows a an empty tree

and I’m unable to track the birthday package
which could be hidden under the welcome
mat or in the garden with the spoiled apples.

When I return it, there shouldn’t be a restocking
fee like in the Merchant of Venice.
Only the upheld blade unable to skin.

---

Home Remedy

The press of lips holds back the confession
like the moan from a mirror image that
shows the places that turned red.  Jesus,

my mother prayed when then purple formed
from the unknown disease.  She believed
that every illness starts through physical

contact.  Boil the spoons, overlay
the sweaters, you’re too old to be kissed
on the cheek, but too young to wait for

the coin in your mouth to rust.



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Darrell Dela Cruz graduated from San Jose State’s MFA Program for Poetry.  His work has appeared in or will appear forthcoming in The William & Mary Review, Grasslimb, Rock & Sling, OCA Enizagam, and Thin Air.  He tries to analyze poems on his blog retailmfa.blogspot.com or rather he acknowledges his misinterpretations of poems. ­­