False Gods

I've imagined that God-
like an old italian man
selling ice cream on a beach
for a few dollars
to buy his wife roses-
would sing out the name
of the one thing I wanted
in a harmony
I wouldn't hear
until I saw my favorite flavor
in his cart.
Plump and rosy,
he'd smile
and squint his watery eyes,
call me bella
and hand me a scoop.

Walking away,
he'd whistle through puckered lips
a simple tune
I'd quickly forget,
licking drips of chocolate
from my wrist.

Steel Guns

To witness people’s quiet oddities
will always bring me back to early days
when nothing mattered but if I could play
with neighbor children. Only sharpened blades
of fresh cut grass could pierce the bubble made
around our games, though watchful parents tried
to temper manic plans. Now, any word
of judgment or of doubt can bring a plan
to end and I, for one, don’t care to test
my skills of dodging rival bullets now
that guns have turned to steel and blood is real
and friends who lose don’t fake the wounds they feel.