A WORD
Say you forgot your name. Say you hung
from the smog. Say your teeth escaped again.
Say you smeared yourself in fat. Say you
broke your jaw on the sun. Say you sang
with the sugar hyenas. Say you were unlaced
by a language. Say you prayed to a shivering
glacier. Say you ate even the grief of the
honey. Say you took the razor moon in your
lung. Say you went rigid inside the night’s
throat. Say you cleaved your breath with a
hammer. Say you rose like a flood in your
drunken heart. Say you remain upside-down
in your mother. Say you you let the lover
stitch you to the storm. Say they lit the pages
of your blood on fire. Say the lover’s name &
say their name. Say the name that you cannot
say. Say you are the image of your bitterness,
& I will be here again my love, waltzing you
through your wreckages, gathering up your
fallen petals, beginning the inevitable work.
Jeremy Radin is a poet, actor, and teacher. His poems have appeared (or are forthcoming) Gulf Coast, The Cortland Review, The Journal, Vinyl, Passages North, Cosmonauts Avenue, and elsewhere. He is the author of two collections of poetry, Slow Dance with Sasquatch (Write Bloody Publishing, 2012) and Dear Sal (not a cult press, 2017). He lives in Los Angeles with his six plants and refrigerator. Follow him @germyradin
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