Kool-Aid Poems – MD Wheatley

September 9, 2023

i didn’t know you then
and idk them now

we were drunk
on Kool-Aid
when i taught them
how to swim

i can still taste
the sunblock cocktail
when i’d spit and
the two mixed

red like blood

red light wish

Kool-Aid whisper-sips

just a couple of
neighborhood nelipots
bouncing between homes
with burning white rocks
lodged between our toes

if my house was the sun,
theirs was the moon

i learned how
to share a room
way before i knew
how to have fun

 

 

trying to catch
my breath

if i chose
to deteriorate,
would you let me?

or would you
remind me of
all the times
we made sweet,
sweet love
then ate ice cream?

if i blamed
my amnesia,
would you
flip the script
and point the
finger at God?

we made God out
to be our father
when really
She’s our mother

making out with you
feels like making out
with God

you caress
my eyebrow-scar
and my temporal body
explodes

disembodied—
you cradle
my head
in your arms
like our baby

i try to speak
but my voice
gives out

i try to breathe
but choke on
Kool-Aid

your whispers—
i can’t make out,
we butterfly kiss
then you release

my head into the clouds.

 

 

nothing gold can stay

whenever i blink

24 hours pass by

and the glowing

red trash can is

still full of

hazardous Kool-Aid