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73 | Pruning Roses at Corcoran Prison for George Moats Through black, wiry arm hairs inky roses trail, wrapped around a fat bicep, unwinding a scroll of Rubaiyats, Perpetuals, Climbing Night. On C yard he smells electrical perfumes, snips the tired blooms back to leaves spread like five fingers. He knows the bite of White Knight, Lowell Thomas, Queen Elizabeth, knows what they can do to him; his hands have learned directly from teeth buried under the soft skirts. The Nam vet who heads the garden crew has taught him what to do— | 74 how to leave the center clean, removing scaled and lesioned limbs, sacrificing old wood for new. Taking one bloom for another, sour chow-breath blends with sweet when he bows to them, much like his brother’s kowtow to American Beauty, Camelot, Chrysler Imperial, Oklahoma— memory’s thorn of love blooming inside a dark thigh, creeping up a ropy neck, spiky, anonymous valentine art, always the same generic dream— a past or future country where it’s not always lockdown, not always the dormant season. ...

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