James Diaz
Amnesic Mnemosyne
This penchant for disaster
turning into the lung
and shattering home
the missing link
of morning after
and tug the wheel hard
here comes the sharp turn
the liver and the fable of spots,
my mother, your mother,
hurry, the road is closing,
city and sky collapsing
red or darker red
or color blind
forgiveness
eclipsing alternative routes home
the acorns turned into diamonds
turned into the long neck of Oswego swans
shudder to think
palm and sweat of the brow
you are more blessed than you can possibly know
I cannot hold this light for you
day is, night is not
an indefinable brokenness
as regrettable as when God divided the firmament
and put pain into the hills
presence into the skin, flicker, flare, staring east
releasing the arrow
the sacrament is a cracked lip
and bruised knees the insignia of a mismanaged love
no more words, you have too many already
the amnesia opens, here, I open, we are both so open
anything could enter us now.
James Diaz, an activist and author, lives in upstate New York. His work has appeared in Ditch, Chronogram, Cheap Pop Lit, Foliate Oak, The Voices Project, Pismire, Epigraph, My Favorite Bullet, and Collective Exile. He is the founding editor of the literary arts magazine Anti-Heroin Chic.
This poem is not previously published.