There are gray dashes
& red dashes in my beard,
but I don’t have red hair 

& I don’t have gray hair
& I think the words
I’ve chosen to speak 

out loud might have left
a trail, might have left
the remains of a deer 

around my thin lips
& I think I know why.
I’ve been hunting

a new violence
since I cannot seem
to penetrate the old 

& in Ohio, the deer
you kill always decorate
your face with ghost kisses.