Alchemy Horse

American they said + + but Horse I dreamed
                                                                                 , and Horse became

                        ++            ++            ++
+  ++       +++     ++     ++    +++       ++     ++
               +            +++                           +++             +

+ + + I was cleaved + from human-earth + + +
Redsap lymph calcium + + + Atlas and femur
            , A new Chaos—
+ come forth + through the world’s foaming + crust
            + + then licked + into my roan skin

+ + + A flesh being bearing + its first dreamSelf + + +

I came to life + + how stars appear—
            , Of dust + +

collapsed + till struck
                                    +        + +
+ ++              +     ++ to light + + +       +
       +      ++   +        +            +   +     ++

            Dream-erupted—
, Gila Monsters + lavablack + +

                          +++ Land +++ +++ +++
                                                      , All its thunders + + +

            In this great magnetic field + +
I am a knowledge system + + +

My hair is a tangled Mojave Dictionary + + +
            , And my tongue + is a danger + +
I speak a darkwhip + into the haboob’s goldthrob + + +

This valley’s bright-weather is my ceremony + + +
, Flashflood + is my medicine—
            + + how I clean myself of Self

+ + + America + + Hoard of Property + is a debris
            + of my cells— limestone + + wound-porous +
sea-floor + + basalt + trilobite + camel bones +                          
            , glass and Blackmountain + + +
                                         +
                                    + + + +
                              + + + + + + +

+ + + We professional mourners + +
            crying for our lives + and for hire + + +
From dark-colonies + in the caves behind our hearts
+ + we weep the sun to fall + and bats into the sky

            , The strain + of anything + that grows
+ + + Sand rose + + iron wood + + smoke tree + + +
We tend dune-gardens + from Deadlands + +
            till the halite beds + + reap selenite thorns +
from the horned toads’ backs + + + 

+ + + In the a.m. heatwarp + vultures 
+ ripple the violet skydome + + +
A swarm of bloodgloved-archivists + + +
            They sky-write                                  + +
+ + + + +                     + + +                   + +
            + + +      + + + directions—
                + + + +                        + + + + 
          + +                                            + +
    + +                                                        + +
, To the museum , To the university
            , To the hospital + + +

In this Epoch of Citizenship +
I must arrive everywhere twice—
            , Occupied and Unceded + + +
One hand The Comet + +
the other hand + Who Makes the Comet Come
+ + + So call me Lodestone + or Alone + + +
            Whisper me +
                         , Secret Magnet + + +

In pink twilight + + my love and I are effigies
            + + leaching salt +
through our terracotta hands + + +

My language clays + + and maps +
amaranth lather + along my thigh—a migration
            + of Exile—
, A self-determined Relocation of pleasure—
                         , wantneed + + +

We are the origin + + oxygen + and always becoming
            + + + Bloodworms
+ from which new land might grow + + +
            , How we make soil + +
then mud where we laid + + +
Alchemy of our wet denim skinz + and gravity + + +

We pulse animal and sensual + + +
            Thundercats of love + greening the desert—
, Pale grasses + fruit in my breath
            + + grey-green along the belly of the nightbranch + + +

            We are + unacreable
+ + + We abrade + the transit + the survey
+ + hold tight and repeat ourselves +
            in crystal lattice + + +

Come morning + + + Come Mercurylight + + +
We are blessed and scattered + + +
Shards + of a horsehead + water jar—
            , Lonely for a body + + and aching +
for the cool taste + and shape the first water once took + + +

This Nation + is a white bright + magnesium
            + NDN burn + + +
I fume and illumine + in its quantum-arson—
            , Indian Iron Alchemy Horse + + +

+ + + My brothers are the Cold Killers + +
shovelers + of silver anthracite + +
            fuelgods + of the midnight train

            + boxcar + jumptrack + jolt-light
+ + + Vaporing + + nightsalt + to cloud—
            , Mustanging + + +

Every desert highway is sacred +
            and gas station pumps + break our hearts + + +
We have pedal bones + white doctors call coffin bones
+ + + That’s why I’m always dying—

+ + + That’s why—
, I’m always halfghost + + half-back + + half-dressed
+ as the war party who will return—
, With a full tank of gas + + +
            , And a stick of scalps + + +

Tonight the city + + is a tectonic bone radio—
            , Our ancestors are on every channel + + +

Scorpions whip and fluoresce + from the shadows of Settler houses
Green-eyed wolf spiders + emerge from their dens +
            to join the dark hunt + + +

The midnight train + monsoons + around the bend
+ + recognizes me + as a relation + and cries +
            Chuk+Shon     Chuk+Shon     Chuk+Shon

            + +     + +        + +     + +        + +     + +           
            + +     + +        + +     + +        + +     + +                       
            + +     + +        + +     + +        + +     + +                       

+ + + We are each + the other’s + passenger + + +

+ + + On the horizon + my warriors volcano + + +
            + + + I shatter cinders + from my hair
+ + I’ll watch them eat the day-aliens with flame
            + + + American + NDN + horse pyre + + +

The Hohokam canals + crack awake + +
gush their ghostwaters + through the settlement streets + + +
            blister + and boneflower + + +

I war whoop out + into the empty + displaced hip +
of the Ghost-sea + + and the Ghost-sea +
            war-weeps back +
spiraling + the etched shells of my ears + + +

+  + + A + M + E + R + I + C + A—
, Haunted hotel + shiprock + rockwreck + ship of fools + + +
            , Little giant cemetery + of braids
              + +       + +       + +       + +    
                x           x            x           x
             +++     +++      +++     +++
                x           x            x           x
              + +       + +       + +       + +
                +           +          +           +

+ + + Beloved Occupiers + + I am posting notice—
            , There is no more vacancy + + +

When this world has ended + I will carry my people + Home
+ + +

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“This poem is a wonder alongside the work and language of Brad Kahlhamer, Sky Hopinka, Nicole Wallace, Christina Sharpe, Dele Adeyemo, Nadia Yala Kisukidi, Rinaldo Walcott, Paul Celan, and Black Sabbath’s ‘Iron Man.’”
—Natalie Diaz