Sex+: Two poems by Dia Roth

Fist
  for Jess

Late summer is the sluttiest 
season my digital violet 
crocs are in sport-mode. 
Tuesday and I drive through a valley 
of evergreens. We try to remember
the names of all the different
clouds—there are just so many.
I text the group chat to offer 
my apartment as a fuckpad 
while I’m away. Jess replies let’s all pray 
that I need a fuckpad by the end of the year.
I say amen. Liz says yes. One time,
Jess found their way back to us
in a crowd by complimenting every person 
they slipped past. And I meant 
every word. A new tinder match
asks me for my thoughts on death. 
What do I say to that? How can I be sure 
this is a playground game and not my soul
leaving my body? The tiniest gorge
runs along this stretch of highway.
I never could resist a hidden body
of water. I take off the little shirt
Jess bought for me: “WHO CARES”
embroidered on a patch over my heart.




Golden Showers

after Chessy Normile’s “Color Theory”

I once used a fistful of cornflowers to wipe
myself after shaking off on the side of the road. 
You were there. You saw it all. How the droplets 
clung to each living thing. Yellow makes me believe 
in the color blue. Or is it the opposite? Mesh bag 
of tangerines, dial gold hand soap, empty prescription 
bottles. Remember the praying mantis? It shot fire 
from its antennae then told us its favorite song. 
Fire! No kidding. Like Wednesday, and dribbles of piss 
left behind on the toilet seat. Very dehydrated. 
I say Thursday is green. You disagree. You think 
it’s gray. We agree that Monday is red and it pains you 
to say it but you think Tuesday is blue. 
You hate blue because of your mom and I get that—
I hate Quality Time because of mine. A stream 
of water pours from the sky. A desert mirage. 
A desert miracle. At the thrift store, I pick out a pair 
of vintage gold nipple rings. Maybe that’s gross, 
but at least it’s slutty. You consider blue jeans. 
How the indigo will stain my fingers 
long after yellow has faded from the sky. 

About Dia Roth

Dia Roth is a non-binary femme poet living in Seattle. They are an Assistant Editor at Hooligan Mag. Their work appears or is forthcoming in Poetry Northwest, Sonora Review, HAD, and elsewhere. You can find them partially submerged in the nearest body of water. They tweet @diaroth____.