Then, suffering was a suffix.
Like oid,           or ite, like the burning

before touch, or the tension implied
in abstinence. The invisible lines

on a couch between unrelated thighs.
Waiting:          the connective tissue

Papi called a lesson. Then, silence
explained what lifetimes had pain-

stakingly gathered. There's a trick to it,
he'd say. Nine out of ten lines are man

made. Shooting? Too violent. Star?
Too false.        Some things, he'd say,

don't want a story. The sky so littered
with broken barriers we couldn't hear him.

Not now, not then.