Styx
by Randall James Tyrone
Can you be going to Hell too soon
if you belong there聽 聽 i鈥檓 waiting to form the horns out my skull i know
i have in my brain聽 聽Jesus be a gun聽 聽When we die we all turn into stones
skipping across the water鈥檚 surface
until we stop There鈥檚 only one way the river flows聽 聽 over us聽 聽 i鈥檓 trying
to find the benefit to spending a life under the sun
The humidity is a stranglehold聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽Sweating until i get goosebumps
from the chills聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽& this wetness surrounds me
like i wasn鈥檛 already baptized in hunger-filled pot bellies
& the purging of credit union accounts My neighbors wear a gut鈥檚 gunshot
repair zipper wound like ancestral tattoos
聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 in this circle Thank God
聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽there is nothing after this
This poem is from my forthcoming debut collection called City of Dis (Texas Review Press, Fall 2025). The collection is a novel in verse that is named after and takes place in the lower circles of Dante鈥檚 Inferno. At this point in the narrative the speaker in the poem has experienced various hazards within their environment, and their faltering mental health leads them to believe that they are more conditioned for Hell than anything else.
During the time I was rewriting this book after my old computer鈥檚 hard drive died in 2022, I was trying to think through familial grief and the blame we assign ourselves when negative things happen. I kept thinking about the phrase, 鈥淰ictims in our own lives.鈥� And I can鈥檛 remember where that phrase came from now, but I remembered the flood of guilt that comes with the idea of victimization and the search for relief from the emotional toll of that label (victim). Or with the phrase 鈥淛esus be a gun,鈥� salvation. But during this time, I was also thinking about the idea of Heaven or salvation. I was wondering if I would even want to go to such a place. When you spend enough in grime the idea of being clean is more foreign than we realize or maybe want to admit.
This led to a more perverse line of thinking about relief. And while the ending can be, and maybe should be, seen as sarcastic in a book about the afterlife, there is also a feeling of relief that comes with the certainty of an end. That at this point in suffering there is nothing left.
.
Randall James Tyrone holds an MFA from the University of Wyoming. His poems are forthcoming or have appeared in Electric Literature鈥檚 Okey-Panky, Gulf Coast, Indiana Review, and Bodies Built for A Game Anthology by Prairie聽 Schooner. His forthcoming collection City of Dis will be released in fall 2025 by聽 Texas Review Press. Currently, Tyrone leads Writers Who Aren鈥檛 Writing, a collective where Houston-area writers and artists gather to workshop their聽 writing, exchange ideas, and find community support. He鈥檚 very excited for you.