The only country in South America
where English is the first language,
colonists beat indentured servants
for speaking in their mother tongue.
One out of ten adults can’t read or write.
The second-highest suicide rate in the world.
Every afternoon I drive past a mother and two boys,
stripped to cloth and bone, flesh torn off like roadkill.
I drove by a bus a few nights ago
that had the entire front half melted off
from a head-on collision, charred corpses
still bucked into their seatbelts.
Two men I met at a bar were arrested
for chopping up a homeless man.
A guy who flirted with my cousin
was beheaded trying to break up a fight.
I met a girl once whose cancer ate her face,
her head a blob of tumor and teeth.
Grandma Rita told me she died the week later,
skin flaking until they covered her with dirt.
For as long as she’s been wary,
Grandma Rita’s slept with a handgun
under her pillow. She keeps a flashlight
on her left and her phone on the dresser.
But besides the nitty-gritty,
Ahona sends me a message today:
an image of a white cup, bleached hands and green nails
in front of a pretty beach I’ve never seen, captioned
The first Starbucks in Guyana opens today!