after Tarfia Faizullah
i was hurt i wasn’t i saw it
on the internet licked yogurt
from a spoon while the girls
described their blood hot seizing
the cotton of a sheet i am speaking
from the cut place from my other
mouths do not believe me for i
was never cut or i was hurt but
never sewn or i wasn’t i want
-ed it i didn’t i screamed i didn’t
i bit down i bled i didn’t i click
through pictures of the girls moonfaced
thick-cheeked still fastened to the
roundness of childhood consider
the softness of my jaw my face without
angles without edges i covered
i cowered i didn’t i cried i came to
i click & learn their names incant them
i learn the names of the stones the theory
it wasn’t me i think of all the ways
we match it could have been it
couldn’t consider the cut place thick
liquid of citizenship spilling from
my many mouths uncut my many
uncut mouths
2018
Regular
Contemporary
Body & Body Image
Identity
Violence & War
Womanhood
After Poems
A poem where the form, theme, subject, style, or line(s) is inspired by the work another poet.
Alliteration
the repetition of the same letter or sound at the beginning of words appearing in succession
Anaphora
a figure of speech in which words repeat at the beginning of successive clauses, phrases, or sentences
Caesura
a break between words within a metrical foot
Enjambment
a line break interrupting the middle of a phrase which continues on to the next line
Metaphor
a comparison between two unrelated things through a shared characteristic