with a 9-millimeter Luger.

If you will go

to the memory of her third birthday party, which cuts

red rivers down the dusty interior window, you’ll see rose petals

sprinkled across glass crying down

one mile east

from where they crown her. The press’s princess

shys down in her seat, crumpled in to hide the freckles

of crimson caked on her cheeks, hidden

on Columbus Parkway,

oil-thick memories drip from her head, snakes

through her hair. The leak unpooling the imprisoned

past from the depths of her brain,

you will find

the growl of the idle engine as discreet as her chittering

laughter in between breaks of kissing men in Blue Rock

Springs. The memory is hole punched to light on her chest, just

kids in a brown car

as her last memories drop like cords

across the steering wheel, glistening

lipstick red on white plastic,

they were shot