Sonnet for Emily Dickinson
In the absence of an alarm, there are
the birds & in the absence of the birds,
there are the sirens & the city clamor
wailing then stretching its jaws—that
despite its inception, only continues for
so long before it becomes a routine—& this
isn’t to say that this is how I’ve envisioned
myself—past or present, to be carving masks
underneath melodic hymns, too cumbrous,
too aware, or otherwise about the score
the body holds, like the Hermit—cloaked
with the Seal of Solomon inside his lantern,
before combusting underneath the metered
sky—bruised or otherwise.
Necromancer
She is the origin, the scar— holding the macrocosm between
her legs / Hecate reincarnate if you will it hard enough,
she becomes the magician, the queen of swords. Her body
is a labyrinth of haze—the inebriation of light in dark matter.
She offers up her skirt, her sleeve—a trick, a cheap talisman—
Pitches you the moon & a way out then envelopes you in
words that smolder, curving off the roof of her tongue, still
producing the right amount of heat to make your veins flush
with fever—leaving you stoned and at a crossroads. Your Achilles
heel is coded in the echoes of smoke that rise and fall between us.
Searching for innovative ways of how poetry can be curated, Jodi Balas is an "ever-evolving" neurodiverse poet who uses a variety of methods to expand her craft. Her work has been accepted in Ghost City Review, Wild Roof Journal, The Willawaw Journal, Grand Little Things, Local Gems Press and elsewhere. She has been a poetry session leader for The Think Center in Wilkes Barre, PA.