Friday, January 25, 2019

Skin-Light by Natalie Diaz


Skin-Light
 
My whole life I have obeyed it—
 
             its every hunting. I move beneath it
             as a jaguar moves, in the dark- 
                         liquid blading of shoulder. 
 
The opened-gold field and glide of the hand,
 
            light-fruited, and scythe-lit. 
 
I have come to this god-made place—
 
           Teotlachco, the ball court—
           because the light called: lightwards!
                        and dwells here, Lamp-land.
 
           We touch the ball of light
           to one another—split bodies stroked bright—
                        desire-knocked.
                                    Light reshapes my lover’s elbow,
 
           a brass whistle. 
 
I put my mouth there—mercy-luxed, and come, we both,
 
           to light. It streams me.
           A rush of scorpions—
                        fast-light. A lash of breath—
                                    god-maker.
 
           Light horizons her hip—springs an ocelot
           cut of chalcedony and magnetite.
                       Hip, limestone and cliffed, 
 
slopes like light into her thigh—light-box, skin-bound.
 
           Wind shakes the calabash,
           disrupts the light to ripple—light-struck,
                       then scatter.  
 
This is the war I was born toward, her skin, 
 
          its lake-glint. I desire—I thirst—
           to be filled—light-well.  
 
The light throbs everything, and songs
 
           against her body, girdling the knee bone.
           Our bodies—light-harnessed, light-thrashed.
                       The bruising: bilirubin bloom,
                                    violet. 
 
A work of all good yokes—blood-light—
 
           to make us think the pain is ours
           to keep, light-trapped, lanterned.
                       I asked for it. I own it—
                                    lightmonger. 
 
I am light now, or on the side of light—
 
           light-head, light-trophied.
           Light-wracked and light-gone.
 
           Still, the sweet maize—an eruption
           of light, or its feast,
                       from the stalk
                                    of my lover’s throat. 
 
And I, light-eater, light-loving.


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