<i><b>Wicked Alice Poetry Journal
wicked alice| spring 2008



Juliet Cook
 


 

Ephemera Collage #1

I have a sequin for an eye,
a vintage zipper for my lips.
If it wasn’t stuck, I would beg
you brush my wig into unsnarled silk,
sift my nerve bundles into special compartments,
& label with cryptic phrases.

Another woman’s detritus could be my bolts of bias-
cut ribbon in Bloodybelly Comb Jelly.
My sudden snips, my little darts, my softly dark
bunny-eared shadows rising up from the crown
moldings.  I have a sewing machine
for a heart, but the bobbin is stuck.

So what would you name me?


*the first line of this poem is also the first line of an Interpol song called ‘Scale’.
 



Ephemera Collage #2

if at times I must be hushed & shorn
let me speak in fragments

my own detritus layered over
my own detritus layered over
my own detritus layered over

like old-school sticky fly catcher
strips hung from ears and tongue

like rows & rows of wickedly sharp
secrets hummed until honed into spindles

if at times I must bite my own lips
let the threshing begin

with paper scraps
with photo corners
with spatter of bright red glitter
all over the clippings


 



Juliet Cook is a poet and the editor of an itty bitty press—Blood Pudding Press.  Her latest chapbooks of original poetry are available via BloodPuddingPress.etsy.com.  Recent publication credits include ‘WOMB’,  ‘Sein Und Werden’, ‘Otoliths’, ‘Death Metal Poetry’ and ‘Prick of The Spindle’, which recently nominated her poem, ‘Some Explanations for Fainting Goats’ for Sundress Publication’s Best of the Net 2007. Cook’s personal blog, CandyDishDoom lives at www.xanga.com/CandyDishDoom.  A newly edited/designed poetry magazine starring the work of 28 different delicious poets is also available now from Blood Pudding Press—it is called [GROWLING SOFTLY].