Song of the Sad Assassin

We lifted the body
from the water like a gown
You took off your bra
to wrap the wound,
though the man was dead
and there was no need.
Then your face turned red
when you said to me:
«I'll suck the marrow out and rape your hollow bones, Yoni.»
Alone, putting three coins into a washing machine,
next to a caulked, cracked wall
in the basement on Fairmount Street,
I feel like a loop of the last eight frames of film before a
slow motion Lee Harvey Oswald
gets shot in the gut and killed
«Billy the kid did what he did and he died.»
-Marilyn Hacker