JC Inman #1 If You Were To Dig

If You Were To Dig

Baguio gold and Marcos blood beneath my feet.

Yamashita’s too.

The monsoon rain soften the ground

Soon we will plant beneath the banana leaves

Peace lilies.

Deeper you dig, the worse the soil is.

A layer of old sayote vines,

Rotten fruit, the dust of sawn pine

And retting fern fronds.

Overturn the compost, dig it in.

The graft is hard, dirty, resists the shovel.

Soon we will plant beneath the banana leaves

Peace lilies.

Magdalena Ball #10: Sammy’s Grave

Sammy’s Grave

Tell me again

half in shade
time, your bastard monkey
fades to murky green
the bridge you left me

every day I get an email
sometimes two
a cry from the past
those soft planks
hieroglyphics
a message I’m still
trying to read

war trauma
sent from a front you never left
always vigilant
enemies are everywhere
tissue thin
the type crisp, sharp
ready for combat

safety is a scar
growing over graffiti
a broken gun, buried
in a deep grave
silvery over the otherwise
perfect skin of infinity
like a name change
a ticker tape parade

sea-stained eyes look into
the future
an illusion that worked
for a while

I taste it now
the sweet, tamped tang of fear
a jagged gift
in smooth wood
in dissolving bones
a language I’m learning.

Magdalena Ball #9: Stones are not rocks

Stones are not rocks

Stones are not rocks are formed
in the body, mineral salts
a hardened substrate
an aggregate

all you couldn’t release
held like granite in the gut

shame is a stone

the strong arm of
tradition, a trajectory
that maims

writing these
words on my body


ink punctures the skin
calcification in soft tissue

chemical bonds
breaking bones

stones are metamorphs
a lump in my hand
crumbles to sand
insubstantial, fake tough

almost nothing
in absence of motion

lying on the stony path
an ache in the upper belly
leaves an imprint on the ground
unclothed, unhinged
your missive hits home

just when I thought
I was finally safe.