It’s possible that this ‘mis-write’ is intentional (I puzzled over this for some time) but as “Therapy,” the earlier version of “Diagnoses,” uses the phrase “salinity is a side/effect of some of the best medications” it would appear that the additional definite article was inserted by accident.
MIRACLE: Once moved up, the phrase that follows this reassigned term is “only on the inside of your hands.” While this seems most obviously referent to skin rash, because of the Biblical and mythical reference introduced in the preceding stanza, combined with the holy room/church confessional dyad on the frontispiece for the section, the reader is encouraged to associatively entertain images of supernatural stigmata. The laying on of hands as a miraculous curative is also implied. In order to maintain continuity, the article terminating the stanza in its revised form needs to be eliminated (as indicated), but this is the only instance in the entire poem when additional editing is required to accommodate the proposed changes.
YOUR HEART: “its touch is jellyfish/devilfish/velvet walking the shine of your brain.” Perhaps the most startling and original metaphor in the poem, this obtuse and intricate conflation, in my estimation, becomes even more powerful and mysterious when paired with your heart. While it works capably with miracle, this reassignment gives the stanza an almost synesthetic tactility, while, at the same time, nodding to the primacy of an atavistic hind brain closed beneath the shiny surface of the cerebral cortex.
CLEAN: “its polished surface” then becomes the poem’s landing place, which both builds out of the preceding stanza, and introduces a perplexing ambiguity. Does it refer to the clean polished surface of the heart or of the brain.
Make no mistake, this poem is as intricately and painstakingly constructed as a ship in a bottle, and the fact that it comes equipped with moveable parts that allow you to choose your own adventure speaks to Zilm’s acumen and virtuosity as a poet. In beginning with a fluid, single-word title that refuses to be fixed as a specific part of speech, the poem starts as it means to go on, challenging the reader to negotiate a dizzying terrain of etymological slips and broken significations. One of the greatest accomplishments of “Diagnoses,” however, is that it illuminates the difficulties inherent to accurately assessing psychological disorder, and documents how a single error in judgment can trigger a chain reaction of false equivalencies.
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[Distillate © HA&L + Phillip Crymble {from the Greek bios} -- the course of a life.]