My brothers have
a bullet.
They keep their bullet
on a leash shiny
as a whip of blood.
My brothers walk their bullet
with a limp—a clipped
hip bone.
My brothers’ bullet
is a math-head, is all geometry,
from a distance is just a bee
and its sting. Like a bee—
you should see my brothers’ bullet
make a comb, by chewing holes
in what is sweet.
My brothers lose
their bullet all the time—
when their bullet takes off on them,
their bullet leaves a hole.
My brothers search their houses,
their bodies for their bullet,
and a little red ghost moans.
Eventually, my brothers call out,
Here, bullet, here—
their bullet comes running, buzzing.
Their bullet always comes
back to them. When their bullet comes
back to them, their bullet
leaves a hole.
My brothers are too slow
for their bullet
because their bullet is in a hurry
and wants to get the lead out.
My brothers’ bullet is dressed
for a red carpet
in a copper jacket.
My brothers tell their bullet,
Careful you don’t hurt somebody
with all that flash.
My brothers kiss their bullet
in a dark cul-de-sac, in front
of the corner store ice machine,
in the passenger seat of their car,
on a strobe-lighted dance floor.
My brothers’ bullet
kisses them back.
My brothers break and dance
for their bullet—the jerk,
the stanky leg. They pop, lock
and drop for their bullet,
a move that has them writhing
on the ground—
the worm, my brothers call it.
Yes, my brothers go all-worm
for their bullet.
My brothers’ bullet is registered,
is a bullet of letters—has a PD,
a CIB, a GSW, if they are lucky
an EMT, if not, a Triple 9, a DNR,
a DOA.
My brothers never call the cops
on their bullet and instead pledge
allegiance to their bullet
with hands over their hearts
and stomachs and throats.
My brothers say they would die
for their bullet. If my brothers die,
their bullet would be lost.
If my brothers die,
there’s no bullet to begin with—
the bullet is for living brothers.
My brothers’ feed their bullet
the way the bulls fed Zeus—
burning, on a pyre, their own
thigh bones wrapped in fat.
My brothers take a knee, bow
against the asphalt, prostrate
on the concrete for their bullet.
We wouldn’t go so far
as to call our bullet
a prophet, my brothers say.
But my brothers’ bullet
is always lit like a night-church.
It makes my brothers holy.
You could say my brothers’ bullet
cleans them—the way red ants
wash the empty white bowl
of a dead coyote’s eye socket.
Yes, my brothers’ bullet
cleans them, makes them
ready for god.
Natalie Diaz was born and raised in the Fort Mojave Indian Village in Needles, California, on the banks of the Colorado River. She is Mojave and an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian tribe. Her first poetry collection, When My Brother Was an Aztec, was published by Copper Canyon Press. She is a Lannan Literary Fellow, a Native Arts Council Foundation Artist Fellow, and a 2015 Hodder Fellow. Diaz is an assistant professor of creative writing at Arizona State University, and teaches at the Institute of American Indian Arts Low Rez MFA program, Princeton University, and New York University. She works with the last remaining speakers at Fort Mojave to revitalize the Mojave language.