POEM [BISHOP]

Nobody gets paintings of themselves done anymore,
but if you knew a guy,
you would. 

I believe this because of the way you squint
your eyes when you smile—you don’t 
want anyone to see your crazy eye teetering
off into a psychotic distance 
that leads to something dark.

The car radio plays a remix 
of Nirvana and techno:

[Here we are now, entertain us. 
I feel stupid and contagious.]

We drive across the earth’s crust
in search of your family. They have dispersed
and fled into the collateral people,
escaping their memories of you
because they think there’s a devil
growing within your meat,
waiting to burst open and shed you
like a wet coat.

They don’t know that instead 
you shed the little devil—a relic of imagination
that didn’t have a snowball’s chance
because you were much, much worse.

Adam Crittenden holds an MFA in poetry from New Mexico State University and serves as an editor for Lingerpost and Puerto del Sol. His work has appeared or will appear in Whiskey Island, Bayou Magazine, Metazen, Barn Owl Review, and several other journals. He currently teaches writing in Albuquerque.

Weave Magazine is a bicoastal literary organization and print publication. We seek to create a space for a cross-section of writers and artists to meet on the page, on the stage, and in workshop. We celebrate diversity in both the creator and their works and strive to showcase both novice and established writers and artists.

Adam Crittenden reads "POEM [BISHOP]" from Weave Magazine Issue 11

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