Dirt my great-uncle drenches the headlines in honey; he watches syllables slur together and become illegible under a sunny ooze   my great-uncle doesn’t know that i wake up early to read the paper before him, that i let scalding sentences slide down my spine, that i coax crinkled commas into my ears   my great-uncle holds a skinned rabbit in one hand and a riffle in the other   when i beg him to dispose of the danger in his palms, he says i’m just a child   he says that forbidden words stumble out of my mouth, words about a world without weapons   he says he’ll destroy the dirt dancing on my tongue   he feeds me detergent for dinner   he doesn’t know that dreams can’t be disinfected