ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Christina Veladota’s poetry has appeared in many literary journals, including The Laurel Review, The Journal, Bellingham Review, Dialogist, Hotel Amerika, and Mid-American Review. The author of two chapbooks, Clutch & Brood (Aldrich Press, 2016) and The Girl & Her Lions (Finishing Line Press, 2010), she currently serves as an associate professor of English Composition & Literature at Washington State Community College in Marietta, Ohio, where she is also the coordinator of The WSCC Honors Program. She is a recipient of a 2014 Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council.
Also by Christina Veladota:
Clutch & Brood
The Girl & Her Lions
An Obituary for 18-year-old Me
Night was the flint on which I lit my cigarette.
Insomnia, my early dementia. The city was high
inside me all summer; its smoke the smoke
I exhaled into the mouths of boy
after boy. Recklessness covered my body
in its fiery garments, smoldered me to cinder.
Every first kiss was an elegy. Every new boy
a hymn inside my breathing. Forgive me.
I was young. What else could I do
but send up flares to warn you.
This poem is part of a manuscript-in-progress that includes a series of “obituary” poems. The manuscript’s subject is not the literal deaths of people; rather, the poems explore former relationships, worn-out ways of viewing the world, and familial secrets. The inaccuracies of memory and the impulse to apologize for past transgressions are also major themes of the work. In “An Obituary for 18-year-old Me,” I reflect upon my youth in an attempt to understand what it meant to be an 18-year-old with her first taste of freedom.
Glass: A Journal of Poetry is published monthly by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
