Naturalization Test

Once the sun bows down, we start killing

                time. Lazily at first, then urgent, as if we know

we are stillborn, still birthing, always falling short

                of a massacre. When I say, Tell me the meaning

of citizenship, I know you keep a dictionary

                beneath your pillow, navigate English

by the withering of it from your tongue. My words

                do not dry with so much blood-

lessness. I scooped my vowels out,

                 called it a lesson in speech therapy:

the ease of my language becoming

                 a weapon. Here, I will find my own

nation. I will mangle border upon border

               on my skin: skirmish, body, war.

We are always failing at our peace. The storm

                learns our violence, weeping tell me

how you got your scars. We say,

                a man holds a woman

like a gun. The moon turns a blind eye:

               at night, everything is urgent. I mourn

our boundaries. I did not coax my language into

               war just to lose

my image in your speech. We are no longer fledgling:

               there are your sounds, and there are mine. Sovereign,

even if we do not want to admit how to accept

               defeat. The color of the dawn waxes

against my teeth. It gushes, fertile. I am still my own

                nation, newborn, now bearing a gun. Lazily

at first, then arid, hostile. Tell me, you wanted this,

               and with want, there will always be blood.