Mary K Gowdy
Hope You Enjoy Your Blood Money
dedicated to Phe Kha Lau
One man in a Wall Street suit
perches to stare at a woman in holey rags.
The suit’s lips are pursed, fingers drumming,
calculating:
how many seconds?
The other lays on a mat that reeks of death,
eyes twitching, chest heaving,
wondering:
how many breaths? 2.
one
two.
The suit uncurls
his legs to hang over the branch, as he elon-
gates his arm to touch the corpse’s cheek
without contaminating his shoes with the musk
of the streets. His heart’s desire peels
off the corpse with the crisp crack of an onion,
but the blood hangs on with a sticky gulp.
He admires his handiwork,
more money made. He scrapes a clot off
of Washington’s face but is too bothered
with grabbing more handfuls to clean the rest.
Once his hands and suit are sticky with his lust,
he returns to his nest
as you watch
one Washington trickles down into your fingers.
The suit doesn’t pause to look at you, but you are grateful
as you shove blood and paper into your mouth,
licking each drop
for you are so hungry.
Mary K Gowdy is the author of the poetry collections Leftover Thoughts (2024) and Where Have We Come From, Where Are We Going? (2022), as well as the chapbook Sensuality (2018). With Olivia J. Bennett, A. M. Tyson, Tyler Hoyle, Brittney Kristina, Sterling M.Z., Olivia Faye Scott, and Maddyson Wilson, Gowdy co-authored the multimedia collection Writing Out Our Twenties (2024). Also a fiction writer, her work has appeared in Better Than Starbucks, Bridge, The Anti-Misogyny Club, SpecPoVerse, and Sheila-Na Gig. A graduate of the University of North Texas, Gowdy works for a refugee resettlement agency in Texas.
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Disturbing and unsettling, as it should be. Thank you.