Liam Strong

Liam Strong (they/them) is a queer neurodivergent cripple punk writer and photographer who owns two Squishmallows, three Buddhas, a VHS of Cats The Musical, and somewhere between four and eight jean jackets. They are the author of the chapbook Everyone's Left the Hometown Show (Bottlecap Press, 2023). Find them on Instagram/Twitter: @beanbie666.  https://linktr.ee/liamstrong666

Easy read of the poems in the images above:

prayer for those who jog

after Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha

baruch. i cannot wish for you dystopian knees nor
can i wish a lack of benediction but

may you never have to hear a prayer on behalf
of healing or sickness, tehillim 119 for

instance, an acrostic, an invocation of your name in
hebrew letters. i cannot wish hurt. i cannot wish

slow wind, because what is that. is it my
legs. tenderness in the fascia, roads

splint under your swiftness. i wish that
you do not wish for me to be cured. kuf, resh, ayin, shin, tet,

nun. doom is a pleasant thing when it is only
in one distant phalange. & yet, may you never

be tripped underfoot, may your asics & brooks
turn shattered earth into ada compliant

paradise. i am weathered by my sighing. bone &
muscle don’t wish for either strength

or weakness. my body wants to know what my body wants.
burden is often described as a weight, imperfections

as embraceable. may all your limbs welcome
flaws, because your frames are able &

can withstand anything. as long as you allow love
into your heart. mountains & obstacles are

subjective. they are as waste, belittlement, gravel.
may you always outrun anyone who declares your

pain & effort to be fruitless stems. may the prickle
of myrrh be different in your tendons, your

nerves. let you always have control
of your flesh, your pith. may i never have to run

from you. in your brilliant wake, you will leave darkness.
may the future chase after you instead. lech l’shalom.

bone erasure

(in the image above, the poem runs narrowly down the right edge of the page with every other line indented.)

caliber of the non-

moral.

un-sub-con-dis-poss-diff-surv-min

your

standard apocalypse unparalleled to

grief

the smell of sweat. magical scientism

narrates:

[solid black line]

theorem:

(maj) - mei —> any number less than

zero (0).

solvable separation: surgically, the

order

of operations supplies an in-

correct

answer 0% of instances.

ex:

[this line appears inside of a black-outlined box] the box ensures safety for the ⊕

mod-

ification in a function due to

another

function. tonal interval, sound of

snapped

structure, emotional note equaling

akin

to mournful. when the quotient is a

fraction

or decimal above zero, simply round

down.