ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Karisma Price was born and raised in New Orleans, LA and holds a BA in creative writing from Columbia University. She is an MFA candidate in poetry at New York University where she is a Writers in the Public Schools Fellow. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Four Way Review, Vinyl Poetry, Rookie Magazine, and Leveler. Karisma lives in New York City, and along with Kwame Opoku-Duku III, she is a founding member of the Unbnd Collective.
Also by Karisma Price:
This Is a Song for the Good Girl (or the Lonely)
C. J. Peete, Magnolia 2004
July, 2008
The Poet’s Conscience Speaks
What do you have left to say,
that you’ve grieved
all the black men you can no longer
touch? How one dimensional you are that you will
water the magnolias that rupture
your father’s eyes while your mother still lives
above ground, that you’ve tried to find the female
in every man around you
and have failed.
That’s fucked up, right? That you know
no one was there for Renisha, or Miriam, that
you’ve seen Shantel’s face on a shirt,
and Aiyana has been turned fiction.
Every now and again you look at your mother
and ask, did you ever have a dream?
She did.
Now that she has split herself open onto you,
an aloe plant brandishing
cumbersome gel, do you understand
your mistake? You don’t?
Remember the woman as black
as God pulling
your hand away from the hot stove and you
not saying thank you? No?
Now, whose fault is that?
Glass: A Journal of Poetry is published monthly by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
