<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div dir="auto" style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Grief Work<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">I have gazed the black flower blooming</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">her animal eye. Gacela oscura. Negra llorona.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">Along the clayen banks I follow her-astonished,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">gathering grief’s petals she lets fall like horns.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">Why not now go toward the things I love?</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">Like Jacob’s angel, I touched the garnet of her wrist,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">and she knew my name. And I knew hers—</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">it was <em style="box-sizing: border-box;" class="">Auxocromo</em>, it was <em style="box-sizing: border-box;" class="">Cromóforo</em>, it was <em style="box-sizing: border-box;" class="">Eliza</em>.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">It hurtled through me like honeyed-rum.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">When the eyes and lips are touched with honey</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">what is seen and said will never be the same.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">Eve took the apple in that ache-opened mouth,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">on fire and in pieces, from the knife’s sharp edge.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">In the photo her fist presses against the red-gold</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">geometry of her thigh. Black nylon, black garter,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">unsolvable mysterium—I have to close my eyes to see.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">Achilles chasing Hektor round the walls of Ilium</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">three times. How long must I circle</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">the high gate above her knees?</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">Again the gods put their large hands in me,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">move me, break my heart like a clay jar of wine,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">loosen a beast from some darklong depth—</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">my melancholy is hoofed. I, the terrible beautiful</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">Lampon, a shining devour-horse tethered</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">at the bronze manger of her collarbones.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">I do my grief work with her body—labor</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">to make the emerald tigers in her hips leap,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">lead them burning green</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">to drink from the violet jetting her.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">We go where there is love, to the river,</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">on our knees beneath the sweet water.</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">I pull her under four times</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">until we are rivered. We are rearranged.</span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; color: rgb(52, 52, 52); font-size: 17.6px; font-variant-ligatures: normal; orphans: 2; widows: 2; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); text-decoration-thickness: initial;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">I wash the silk and silt of her from my hands—</span><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" class=""><span class="long-line" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-indent: -32px; margin-left: 32px; display: inline-block;">now who I come to, I come clean to, I come good to.</span></p><div class=""><br class=""></div></div><div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Natalie Diaz</div></div></body></html>