We steal four filet mignons

for every workday of the week. Except

Sunday we eat out, order Chicken Adobo,

and I worry about one day no longer loving you.

Most days I wake up veg­e­tar­i­an and end

with greased blood between my teeth.

To my knowl­edge, my dog has never turned away

from meat. But he has turned away from me.

I feed him a bone from the Halal Meat Market and watch

as, upon my carpet, he tears apart the remaining

muscles; turning it back into a thick slab of col­la­gen and calcium.

The third time we touched, I had bloody knees.

Pockets of puss bub­bling above my skinned knee caps.

I still do not under­stand what breath­ing into our pain

means, but we exhaled some­thing. The end of the month

is near. There is blood stained on my bedsheets,

blood stained on my carpets, and blood stained on

my under­wear; on so many pairs. I keep it all away

from my dog. I teach him to be a bystander every time

he wants to eat from the man on the street. And just last week

we saw the same man leaned up against

the tree roots shoot­ing up. I did nothing, but watch

as if, at base, all we are is raw.