Jeff Chester's Curse

Our courage breaks
      in a black wind & dies
on Pearl Street
      I thought of ears that were
shell-like & deaf as
      flagstones piled high as thunder
in a bowl of tortilla soup

When the little girls go
      grass-green hollow
beneath their tattoos
      it makes you want to
rewrite the Upanishads
      under a burning bridge
on the only road
      out of here