track 1.

i’m weak in all the ways my father was
so sought the sea to try to wash it away
thought i caught a glimpse of what i could be
    an island
       sheets of basalt rigid in green blue
with fig tree roots
seeping into my fault lines

up close saw a hole where water should be
knew then
  that i’d never seem clean
fought my father’s mirage
steaming off the surface
fists crashing waves crashing
              but all fault’s mine
made myself poet in slow tide
                      instead of stone

track 2.

i’m on my very best behavior
swallowing spite by the spoonful

got bloodstains on my new seats
pops warned against an allblack whip
whipping it while blasting classics
to combat that infinite sea
sloshing around in my chest

might be best if i called up my brother
asked him to take me out of oakland
every nigga moves to vegas eventually

scrubbing the passenger seat becomes
a daily ritual wish it never taught me
i’m wasteful i’ll consume every
punctuation on every page till infinity
looks a little smaller
                    a little more manageable

track 3.

i’m not enough for you anymore
still forget to water the basil while you’re gone
must be a part of me wants them dead
the same part hiding out
at bart stations east of oakland etching
your name into concrete walls
until my calligraphy
is almost as perfect as you

let’s fallback and forget what got us here
you said in the voicemail you left
right as the last redline departed

not so sure that’s possible no more
    there’s so much of this city yet to be seen

track 4.

i see bubbles blow down broadway
and here i am now
                a girl in brown and
until today never seen
      a city so blue

those abandoned by bart
      blabber on afraid
they’ll forget how to speak
if they don’t practice

i only spoke when spoken to
                    and so spoke
so little sugar pines took root
where my words would be
between my teeth and
the obedient pleasantries

yes ma’am no sir
wasn’t trying to talk back

was just trying to blow bubbles
  but the pines keep popping them
and blotting out the blue

track 5.

and just like that i’ve become unessential
got like two songs left in me

forgot all the names of the fauna
found on my way to work
the bushes of bright magenta
the trees sprouting like weeds
unless ripped out from the roots

every story i read is disappointing
doom scrolling till sleep and screen
fall on my face at night
tried to show them my poems
all they could muster was a
I like it, but who’s this for?

for niggas like me oakland’s big enough
can pinch a spliff off almost anyone
can watch that blue light flash through
shit was getting good for a minute there
but life loves nothing more than refrains

somebody bring me my magentas
release the last track posthumously
recite these poems like prayers

track 6.

y’all got nothing we need
broken people with broken children
we breaking the curse just by breathing
in and out the house just to see
  what’ll happen
now that we the grown folks

you can head home anytime
they won’t treat you as good as this

bubbles fizz off the tin can top
chairs in each room in case you can’t stand
no more panhandling for a pound
of respect that we heave in spades

   this the last time i talk about the bloodstains
      caked on my mothers’ knuckles
least that’s the lie we’d like to believe

let’s fallback on bubblegum pink and
                        mellow yellowy pop songs
the ones where white boys wear
baggy briefs fresh jays snapbacks
then bag a better rebrand than when
wife beaters became under shirts

track 7.

i was a senior in a class of sophomores
running a grift on my own ego
only made it easier to get my thunder took
now i don’t wanna walk in the rain

somebody lie to me
                              let me believe
these death valley days are forever
four petals one frame wilt but won’t die

truth told lost all sense of trust back when
had a pacifier pinched to the bib
had my hands stretched for a father
only seen on occasion
running out of time to reconcile this
and walk fearless in the rainfall

track 8.

wanna ride out on a high note
in a little red corvette like my uncle’s
yeah     like the prince song
except somehow i’ll soup mines up
so it pumps tupac through the subs
          like the old bloods

wanna be a man now not like my father
      and not need therapy
all my fall downs
            gonna have quick climb backs
matter fact from now on me and mine

wanna walk above where the rain forms
drive cars across andromeda
stack up on black holes in case
any earth dwellers pull up on us
invest in unobservable cosmic boundaries
cribs to gift the suns our prodigies will be

i want all of this even if