Genesis As a Blur Seen from the Driver's Side Window
The girl was a cloud
of moss
over the missing eye of god
in a fire you know where the skin ends
and the bone begins
they gathered their stories in a bundle of heat
whip last and you feel it first
this mountain of thirst tremble up
against the line of blue wall
wrapped round a cloud of sound
say sky but not the how of it
it is here underneath the dire thing
all day they sing it like a broken tooth
drowning in milk - a god is a weapon in the mouth
of everything
we came crawling out of
speak to me of dark matter
and I will show you
where the blade
of the beginning went in
and came out clean
up there they drew the line
but down here
we just walked it.
The Time Of My Life
To be born
is to be ruined
so much more gets lost than found along the way
like a broken radio I kept my parts intact
even in silence
I waited for signal return
an unlikely kind of wild
like maybe forgiveness is always unearned
and whose hands were first to shatter me
also loved me and so on and so on
what is it, this thing in my band-aid heart
telling me how to breathe like a bent arrow through luck-shot air
my god, kid, can you believe we made it this far
and you’d like to laugh it off
but no matter, it matters, you look a lot like them
your people, your kin, your kind
they went wild on you, ate you up,
my god, kid, don’t you know you had to come this way
along the riven path
that your bones were already lit and your blaze is beautiful.
Thousand Oaks
you know who you are
by the shape on the wall
you know how to fall
into place, broken glass
memory shifter, your tired little body
flailing, failing
it's your half light
it's the last call tonight
it's the wild wolf coming for you
ambulance lights
the shape you leave
in the snow
one huge heft of human
wears you down, don't it
getting through
getting by, slept it off one too many times
only putting down what you know
break and break and you're broken
after a while
it's the only way
the light you lay in
hands to the floor, officer, I meant no harm
in the name of the father
i meant only laughter
meant only the name i was given
sour in my mouth
and here i am
take me in your shadow
i am dressed for the kill
i am dressed for the light.
James Diaz is the author of This Someone I Call Stranger (Indolent Books, 2018) and All Things Beautiful Are Bent (forthcoming, Alien Buddha Press, 2021,) as well as the founding Editor of Anti-Heroin Chic. Their work has appeared most recently in Cobra Milk Mag, Bear Creek Gazette and Resurrection Mag. They live in a far too cold and snowy upstate New York, where they are waiting patiently for the Spring.
