I must
not succeed.
Success is the mind-killer.
Success
is the little-death
that brings total
obliteration. I will face
my success. I will
permit it to pass
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And sometimes it is
loss
that we lose,
and sometimes
it is just lips. When I was
a child, I would ask my mother
to tuck me
in, wrap me tight in blankets,
make me into a burrito.
Sometimes I would wait in bed,
pressing my body stiff, like a board,
mind like a feather, silly— setting the scene
to be seen.
So I could be wrapped.
So I could be kissed.
And what
I miss most,
is being made again.
Copyright © 2015 by David Tomas Martinez . Used with permission of the author.
Copyright © 2015 by David Tomas Martinez . Used with permission of the author.

David Tomas Martinez is the author of Hustle (Sarabande Books, 2014) and the forthcoming Crosshatched (Sarabande Books, 2016). He is finishing his PhD in poetry at the University of Houston. Martinez lives in Brooklyn, New York.