Tuesday, November 27, 2018

Undetectable by Danez Smith


Undetectable
 
soundless, it crosses a line, quiets into a seed
& then whatever makes a seed. almost like gone
but not gone. the air kept its shape. not antimatter
but the memory of matter. or of it mattering. it doesn’t
cross my mind now that it whispers so soft it’s almost
silence. but it’s not. someone dragged the screaming boy
so deep into the woods he sounds like the trees now.
gone enough. almost never here. daily, swallowed
within a certain window, a pale-green trail on the tongue
the pale-green pill makes before it’s divvied among
the ghettos of blood, dissolves & absolves
my scarlet brand. ritual & proof. surely science
& witchcraft have the same face. my mother
praises god for this & surely it is his face too.
regimen, you are my miracle. this swallowing
my muscular cult. i am not faithful to much.
i am less a genius of worship than i let on.
but the pill, emerald dialect singing the malady
away. not away. far enough. for now.
i am the most important species in my body.
but one dead boy makes the whole forest
a grave. & he’s in there, in me, in the middle
of all that green. you probably thought
he was fruit.


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