no isla encanta
by Khadijah Queen
dancing girl press, 2007

About the Author:

Khadijah Queen was born near Detroit and raised in Los Angeles. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University Los Angeles. Her poetry, twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize, has appeared in many different journals, including new ohio review, AUGHT and Salt River Review. She currently studies studio art with an emphasis on drawing/painting, sound, installation and performance at Georgia State University as a University Scholar. Visit her website.

from no isla encanta:



Rearrangement

What's not for a girl to love–

The coat of the mouth, the flavor of ruin.
Consider the murk of dwindling, the stones you thought
Were coins. The accidental wounds.

(In the daddy state,
It's illegal
To break your lily flicker of a smile.)
The shadow

your mocked hull broaches. Magnify

a tinge of dust. The sky and the sea even.

The heart metamorphosed. Flown.