Yolanda & Selena Don’t Talk Anymore

I stopped you just in time.
Now you’ll be remembered.
They’ll never hear me sing.
Most of the time,
I’m a Villain
or a lesbian.
Jealousy reveals
a polaroid of the women I am not.
When I called you a “Bitch!”
and shot you
What I meant was,
“Love!”
I just didn’t want you to go.
In another life,
I am someone I can be proud of.
”The face you see in the moon.
In another life,
You want to love me.
We are on the road going 85
playing a tape with only two songs.
My arm is around your shoulders and
we are wasting time like water,
you’re breathing

To dream about love
for all eternity. That’s why
death isn’t so bad. I like to think I’ve been pretty
lucky for all of my life.
I’m a saint
who loved too hard, trusted too deeply. Everyone’s
a prayer whispered violently,
a letter stained with fear.
I heard fans cheering. Their hands came together
because they loved me.
My heart was once the shape of
a pink fist before it turns blue.
I was brain dead before I was a headline.
In this dream,
I am a wife and a mother
a woman who says “Yes.”
I am marinating steak and when you want to try a bite
I let you.
Somewhere far away, I am
on a loop and
I can’t stop smiling.
I am still alive and everyone is watching –
an entire country, singing in my ear.