Balance, onslaught
after Clare Rojas
(I have a diamond house with men. I have pierced men and diamond shoes. I have shoed horses and a tilted head. I have a tilted cart and a flowered scarf. I have a gray dress and a hell of a guitar. I play the guitar and the jukebox jack- in-the-box gutted brown bear and canoe landscape. I play the grayest song and a cat's yarn game.) I sit in the forest with a cat and a knife. (I see the quilted mountains and long knitted birds. I see the man limping across the path of chevrons between the trees. I sit between trees, hanging hair and red mouth. I mouth and sit. The buck stands by the river. I am in my paper mask, my wood.)
Credit
Copyright © 2010 by Khadijah Queen. Used with permission of the author.
Author
Khadijah Queen

Khadijah Queen is the author of six books including Anodyne (Tin House Books, 2020), I’m So Fine: A List of Famous Men & What I Had On (YesYes Books, 2017), and Fearful Beloved (Argos Books, 2015).
Date Published: 2010-01-01
Source URL: https://poets.org/poem/balance-onslaught