• In Pakistan he swings

    from a gallows in the square,
    rope done freeway designs
    around a broken neck.
    Seeing a puppet show
    from my embassy bedroom,
    he prances like Bambi
    in a fit of absent cocaine.

    I’m 14, pretending to be home
    with a white fence and 2.5 kids.
    The crowd builds skyscrapers
    in my ears with chants to Allah,
    raising their fists to God
    but the dear old Lord is ignoring them
    and watching Unsolved Mysteries
    in his Lazy Boy reclining chair.

    I could clench my cross
    but Jesus is a foreigner in this land,
    that drinks over-salted martinis
    and buys cheap Persian rugs.
    Daddy gave him the day off
    as devils play may-pole
    on that man’s dead form.

    Two days later, the body still rots
    a bad prop from a B-rated horror movie.
    Guess Allah and Jesus ran away into the desert,
    pretending to be Moses
    and find an imaginary promise land.