They say his tiny hands
are traumatized relics
of a great family war
that his language
is all fucked up
because there was never
enough love, friends,
attention, and I get it,
I do, I too have known those
who seemed like they had it all
but ended up shooting dope
and in the same room as me
at 21 trying to get clean
and do good by our ragged hearts
but the thing is
we walked
right up to the gates
of what we had done
and owned our shit
made vows to do different
fight the demons that pull on us
at 2 a.m. whispering; no good goddamn brain
feed me, feed me right now
all the poison you got
in this house
and them I know
and them I don't
we say our little prayers
to god's we don't even believe in
we toss and we turn
but we refuse to burn
the world down
because of our pain.
--James Diaz
Bio: James Diaz is the author of This Someone I Call Stranger (Indolent Books, 2018). He lives by the simple but true motto that “feelings matter” every shape and size of feeling. He believes that every small act of kindness makes an often unseen but significant difference in someone’s life and hopes that his poems are a small piece of that.
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