How to Shoot


My brother shot the Barbie  
with a BB gun 
and didn’t run, 
didn't Whoa! didn't 
blow on the end like 
some kinda Cisco Kid.
He slow-lowered, 
waited to see me 
blossom red,
backed away without blinking.
I thought he was practicing 
the craft of serial killer,
first firecrackers in frogs,
a hammer to that stray cat,
a collection of small bones.
But now he lives 
in a cul-de-sac, coaches 
the Long Beach Dodgers, 
and those Little League boys 
adore him, a genuine 
role model I'm told, 
Daisy made.





How to Shoot


The last girl standing 
in Friday the 13th Part 2 or 10
or Halloween XV  
holds the blood-slick gun 
in both shaking hands
points it away from herself 
to save herself
so point-blank wild-fired 
they both kick back 
but she never
hauls ass first never 
recoils again never
bangbangbangbangbang!
(heart-center)
until clickclick clickclick
until shit sure that demon will 
never slow-stalk her again.

When the monster  
disappears she doesn't learn 
Jiu-jitsu, buy an AK-47,  
move to Brazil. 
She is caught off-guard 
in the house next door,
lathering in the shower,
bending at the fridge 
or rifling the wrong 
magazine, the victim 
again, the caliber 
of evil’s revenge. 





How to Shoot


The Nightingale nurse unfolds 
the illustrated injection instructions 
as if we are planning a visit to Bosnia 
and not the landscape of my body 
grown foreign.
She gives me a training pad to strap 
to my thigh and an empty syringe, 
guides my hand in a quick-flick
like throwing a dart 
like throwing a dart
like throwing a dart.
We practice the bulls-eye 
of that false flesh 
until it is a pox of certainty,
until she says I am ready to plunge 
my own crippling deep. 
I feel faint.
I see a tunnel of light. 
She gives me a cookie,
a smile, more practice.
I tell her I can’t, I won’t, 
I'm a bar dice kind of girl.
She checks her watch,
gives my arm a squeeze
(snake-grip) and grins, 
says my time is up.





How to Shoot


1.   Cotton ball, alcohol wipe, decaf coffee. 

2.   Do Not shake the syringe, or the hand that feeds it.
 
3.   Do Not touch the sterilized needle.  Like the hot plate at El Azteca, we mean it.

4.   For a more comfortable injection, warm it or whisky. 

5.   If you have gone in search of whisky, the missing syringe has been cat-batted under the living room couch.

6.   Employees must wash hands before returning to work. 

7.   Find the fattiest tissue; any flabby flesh will do: 

       a) Rotate stock;

       b) to say your thigh is like an orange is to say you are rind and pulp.

8.   Clear mind, quick plunge, 63-degree angle.

9.   Hum a few bars…

10. No premature ejectulation or lather, rinse, repeat.
 
11. Seek assistance if you earned less than a C+ in geometry (see #8).

12. If you see blood in the tube, pull out immediately!

13. There may be bleeding at the injection site; apply profanity.

14. Exhaust all other possibilities for survival.