Azia Armstead
Ode to the Dirt
I walk barefoot in my grandmother’s
yard to be soiled in your purity.
Mother of land oceans cannot
swallow, creator of town and tomb.
You sky for the dead,
ground for the living.
You allow everything to have
a backbone. When I hold you
I am praying with my hands open.
You fall through the spaces in between
my fingers & take the shape of what
the air bends you into.
Here with my feet submerged in the
all of you, you have a way of speaking
to me. Telling me that the
earth & I are like sisters.
Our skin the hue of both
mud & water.
Bad Luck
“You got a roommate
he’ll hear what we do.
It’s only awkward if you’re fucking him too”
– Frank Ocean
When I heard you
making her orgasm
I thought
maybe you came
home drunk again,
stumbled into the
wrong dark room
& fell into a
hole you couldn’t
tell wasn’t me.
Azia Armstead is a poet based in Richmond, Virginia. She currently studies English at Virginia Commonwealth University and is also a fellow of The Watering Hole. Her work has been published by JoINT. Literary Magazine.