Christopher "Rooster" Martinez

/

 A virtual family reunion. A wall of muted wails. 

Everyone takes their moment and machines run a breath through your small body.

//

The second to last time I saw you:

I don’t recall when exactly. Before Thanksgiving, I think, and I dropped by your yellow house. 

I heard you sleep in the front room now--more manageable. Your bedroom: an unmoved, unchanged, mausoleum the last 15 years. Why bother making the bed lonely?  Queen-sized, too large and heavy. I hugged you and said “goodbye, Little Lady.” I snapped a photo to send  to my mother. You wore a Six Flags shirt with Wonder Woman on it.

///

The last time I do remember seeing you

I wandered off into the neighborhood. Awashed in psilocybin. 

The way the world breathes content in its endlessness is a dare to let life go. The center of the universe emits out of  everywhere. I walk under overcast skies, until the sun looks at me and I burn. Thirsty, I  realized how close I live to Yellow House. 

I pass San Fernando Cemetery #2. A grave digger sleeps on a yellow backhoe as still as a bed after a day of filling the earth with us.  I arrive to your absence. I use the manguera like a boy baptizing a 36 year-old man. Preparing to leave and continue on, you arrive like mercy and I am a semi-crazed, wet dog. You invite me in. I sit. We dissolve in discussion  like communion wafers on the tongue. You tell me exactly where everyone is in their respective orbits. I down tap water from a mason jar. Before I leave, you ask if I need a ride. I decline. Opting for the air and the steps ahead. 

A virus rages on unseen, outside. The world refuses to hold us delicately. 

The sky overcast again, and I put one foot in front of another. 

Goodbye, Little Lady.