The Wardrobe's Best Dressed: "Blues Triumphant" by Jonterri Gadson

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MERCY

When the sow doesn’t refuse them her sequence of teats.

When her swollen spotted body, bristles spearing mud

permits a dozen snouts burrowing beneath her—

unapologetic litter of grunts, hungry self-serving soldiers,

cacophonous squeals urging over, over.

Not to protect her face from their hooves,

but that she could crush them, we pen her in. Narrow.

Leave only enough room for her to lay down.

When she doesn’t, in a quiet rage, slaughter them herself

she suffers each unrelenting mouth, she sates our wild

expectations.

This selection comes from the book of poetry, “Blues Triumphant” by Jonterri Gadson, which is available to purchase here from YesYes Books.

Jonterri Gadson is the author of the chapbooks Interruptions (MIEL, 2014) and Pepper Girl (YesYes Books, 2012). She has received scholarships and fellowships from Cave Canem, Bread Loaf, University of Dayton and the University of Virginia where she received her MFA in Creative Writing. She is also a graduate of the Callaloo Creative Writing Workshop. Her poetry has appeared in Callaloo, Los Angeles Review, The Collagist, and other journals. She currently serves as Assistant Professor of Creative Writing/English at Bloomfield, College in New Jersey. Follow her on Twitter at @JaytotheTee.

librecht baker. Long Beach, CA native. Member of Dembrebrah West African Drum and Dance Ensemble. MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts from Goddard College. VONA/Voices and Lambda Literary Writer Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices Fellow. Poetry is forthcoming in Writing the Walls Down: A Convergence of LGBTQ Voices (Trans-Genre Press) and is included in CHORUS: A Literary Mixtape (MTv Books).