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Krista Franklin

Website
Years: 2001, 2002 & 2004

Biography

Krista Franklin is a poet and visual artist whose poetry and collages have been published in Indiana Review, Ecotone, Clam, Callaloo, MiPOesias.com, CultureServe.net, and the anthology Gathering Ground. Her collages have been featured on the covers of award-winning books, and exhibited nationally in solo and group exhibitions. She is a Cave Canem Fellow, a co-founder of Tres Colony, an artist collective, and a co-founder (alongside CC Fellow Duriel E. Harris) of  2nd Sun Salon, a community meeting space for writers, visual and performance artists, musicians and scholars.

Poem

“Jimi often told a story about a girl who tried to ensnare him with voodoo . . .”           - Harry Shapiro and Caesar Glebbeek

 

“Whatever it is that girl put a spell on me."          -Jimi Hendrix

 

Snare

i. tincture

1. rivulet of Stratocaster sweat 2. thimbleful of dust 3. spit 4. 1 shard of broken guitar pick 5. two strands of hair 6. stolen fuchsia scarf 7. 1 shot of rum 8. 1 lit red candle 9. 1 plucked wing of nocturne 10. 2 mason jars of river water 11. 1 handful of bright eyes  12. 1 drop of blood

 

ii. alchemy

 

I loosened the scarf tied around his thigh with my teeth in a roomful of people while we sat on a blood red sofa getting high he laughed I leaned back slipped the fine fabric from his leg with my fingers when I looked at him a shutter snapped burned a light of his inside me I wanted an infinity to lie under the crescent moons of his eyes after that my nights were furious dreams, full as a ninth-month womb:

 

running white coyote I chased through a desert a jade eyed cat jaunting toward me where I reclined beneath a peach tree he meowed once coughed a small ball of guitar string  a woman in a turquoise veil passing by me whispering something  I can’t remember

 

iii. oracle

the unconscious door is ajar one breath could blow it wide open