8th Grade Blues

Bullet wounds,
shots in your head,
drug powder,
scars engraved
in your skin.

skin hidden
in infested tombs,
crime’s home.

home with tattooed
walls, voluntary moats,
solitary confinement.

confinement from which
dark view of the world
is birthed too soon.

too soon
the belief that
no one cares,
no one cares about
you.

You with the attitude,
baggy clothes,
bloodshot eyes,
plummeting grades,
death warrant:
gang signs.

signs that shepherd you
through ash-ridden times.

times in which
your clothes
are stolen, your
nights are mugged
and your little brother
is murdered.

murdered by parent
surrogate of red or blue
gang signs—X, I and V,
norte or sur, a 1 and 3—
numbers and names that
don’t speak, think, or feel.

feel the pain
of coming home,
no parents to talk
to because they’ve
never been there,
are dead, or each
have two jobs.

jobs that can’t even
pay the rent;
skin no longer hides,
but glides through
the death-smell fog,
gets high, drops out,
kills.

kills the neighborhood
you will soon call home.

J. Javier Zamora