Austin Davis is the author of Lotus & The Apocalypse and most recently Compulsive Swim, published in January 2023 from Outcast Press. Davis is a homeless outreach organizer and the founder of AZ Hugs for the Houseless. Born in Indianapolis, Davis now lives and writes in Phoenix, AZ, where he uses poetry as a tool to help those with mental illness feel less alone in their struggles.

Welcome to the Poets Weave. I'm Romayne Rubinas Dorsey. Austin, what poems have you brought for us today?

This is LOTUS & INSOMNIA from Lotus and the Apocalypse

i don’t remember
the last time i slept through the night

i’m so exhausted
my bones feel like soldiers
who shot themselves in war
& were sent home
to their families

when it’s late i walk & smoke
& end up somewhere new

tonight i’m at a park
in a sleepy neighborhood
& i miss my mom
& i hate myself
i puke all over a dead bush

i could wipe it up
with the greasy mcdonald’s napkins
in my back pocket
but i don’t

the sky is clear,
the moon a purple brown

i’m not sure what that means
but if i’ve learned 1 thing in this life

anything can feel like a metaphor
if you’re scared enough

This is a poem that I wrote for my great aunt Mary, who recently passed away in her home in Indianapolis. The poem's called Morning Swim.

I feel that the world has finally softened.
It's been relentless, the grief of being human.
But this morning the light is dizzy & warm
behind the window panes.
It’s like I’m looking up at the sun from underwater.
I like to believe that the end of a long, happy life
feels like swimming, like jumping into the pool
on a hot summer day after walking
blocks and blocks barefoot.
I sat with you for the last time in spring.
I read to you and drank coffee.
You smiled and smiled, watching the birds.
Our love for you is alive and eternal,
like the deep end to a child.
Enjoy the water for me, please.
For you, we’ll dance and sing.

This final poem is the last poem of act III in Compulsive Swim.

in the stomach of summer
we held each other close
as if it was winter

everything happens all the time

the wars
the deaths
the loss

but together
we’re safe

i close my eyes
and feel your eyelashes
on my neck

everything happens all the time

at birth we’re handed this life
without knowing
if we can carry its weight

everything happens all the time
but we find ways to survive

drugs and drink
work and sex

some mornings i wish
i was a small bug on a big leaf

but at night
all i want is to be with you
skin to skin on the couch

lips dark purple
inhaling each other’s laugh
like a cigarette

everything happens all the time
except on a night like this

on nights like these
i imagine that some neptunian teens
have chosen us for their school
community service project

and beamed us to some empty spot
in space for the evening
because they heard how hard it is
to live on earth

at parties
whenever we had to weave
through the crowd to hug a friend
or pour a drink

you always left your hand behind you
for me to hold
so we both ended up in the same place

i think about that when i’m alone
after a long day
drinking on the balcony
listening to the lull of late night traffic

let’s stay wine drunk
until morning
wine drunk
until the lamps dim out

wine drunk
until you have to leave
again

everything happens all the time

but when my days here
are nearly spent

if i can crawl into bed
beside you for another night

kiss your cheek
and watch you smile in your sleep

i couldn’t care less
how much this life
has pulled us to pieces


You've been listening to poems by Austin Davis on the Poets Weave. I'm Romayne Rubinas Dorsey.