BLACK HAIR
I have not written a love poem since the last time I was crossing a busy street seeing that thick black braid trailing down and running to reach it so now I am writing a love poem like a fool who is still seeing that black hair curled this time around stepping off the curb in time to be hit and killed and smiling all the way MANY OF ME How many of me or those like me are hovering birdlike, hummingbirdlike, shimmering above their bodies, looking down and knowing this is not something to drink from. This is not a pink dahlia. This not the body we can survive off, but it is all we have. HAVE I LOST God! Have I lost that Thing I had that made people go OH this is a poem! OH this is a thing which makes me know you Hollis This is a hand pulling off a veil in some old gothic where the face underneath is beautiful maybe either that or it is hideous and you watch cause it is writhing and ready to speak This is digging a nail into the dimple of a cutie nectarine and opening it and splitting it into All of its pieces So that we can all share it while we are at lunch in kindergarten And so that we may each tear into it with That vigor that only children have --- Hollis Teves is a non-binary queer poet who lives and works in Orange, CA and San Diego, CA. Their work has previously appeared in Calliope, Sapere Aude, The Messy Heads, Neologism Poetry Journal, and elsewhere, and they are the co-editor-in-chief of The Fruit Tree. Contact them at hnteves@gmail.com or on Twitter @unisexlove.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Archives
April 2019
Categories |