Body of Render. Felicia Zamora

Love bold

       In the month of not-so-thankful thoughts

       Character beyond definition

       On words: a Thanksgiving thought

       In the make

       Star in burn

       Heliocentric

       America, ain’t I a woman

       Winterize, oh America

       Voice witness, yes, voice

       RAW DELIBERATION OF CIRCUMSTANCES

       This wild in which we

       The retreat

       In search of feminism

       Speak, despite

       Once you lie a lot, it’s like second nature

       Of mouth this heavenly body

       If starlight be

       NO APOLOGIES TO AMERICA ANYMORE

       In our nation’s capital

       Poem to America

       In preparation for fiery climates: a poem to America

       Poem to America

       Loose clench

       Mathematics of healing: a poem to America

       Poem to America

       What of you, child in learn

       In our nation’s capital

       Poem to America

       In our nation’s capital or America is a poem

       Poem to America

       Unapologetic

       Poem to America

       What haunts you now

       Poem to America

       INFINITE DESIGN OF A MOUTH, OPEN

       A method for survival

       Ghost of innocence

       & in unmake, reveal

       & of heart & home America

       Poem for you, America

       & in mend, we

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BODY OF RENDER

      Why are we here if not for each other?

      —Claudia Rankine, Don’t Let Me Be Lonely

      We, too, can divide ourselves, it’s true. But only into flesh and a broken whisper.

      —Wisława Szymbroska, view with a grain of sand

      Say it again—we are spared nothing.

      —Yusef Komunyakaa, I Apologize for the Eyes in My Head

AT THE HAND OF OTHER

      At the hand of other

      & of desire; how we thirst below flesh, below cortex, below pelvis; the minute ticks we hardly keep at bay; how we often inside out; how we bells struck & our music resides first in body, then in {mindful this gap}; we bounce back to ourselves, to lick our own lips & feel the weight of our own motion & emotion: jellyfish in change of water’s influence; to be at the hand of other; say this too, desire; how afferent, we, always in lead toward; how we all nerves in gather, message message & our pupils dilate us; how we all wet & longing, cell to cell.

      In our bundle

      When we think of sticks, do we think tree; oh bramble of me; what part of us, scatters wind, becomes home to something other; how your skinny bones in drape, mulberry limbs; oh slats of light, ribs of; & dusk always resides in chest, in fissures between lobes where all of us lie temporal & disoriented, oh this piece of; suture back; yes a question, no no an answer; how skeletal the bark of us, word & flesh; I left me for you propped against the girth of trunk; how we shed ourselves over & over: snake bundled in snake skin; once, yes, once we were one.

      In fall or other shitty metaphors for depression

      When silence does not exist & the mind drapes in whispers; a creeping creep; clock ticks etch the eardrum; fingers to throat; how lightening in passage; how all this electrification in your chest; cave for sear, in remembrance live, live, live; ribs swell, just before; a growing presence of plead, o-h g-o-d, syllables strung in temporal lobe; how a world smells of Marlboros & whiskey & you adverse to your own life, crawl back into your jaw; & you lug your torso around on sore hips, oh wait of frost to blanket this dead of fall.

      In the light of

      Light exists, then, this November light; how we yellow in the dried, in the plummet; sun, gorgeous sore, tests the pupil in constrict, lips in part more more; say alive & feel it—inside all these organs & cells, how they animate