This selection, chosen by Guest Curator Genevieve Pfeiffer, is from Still Life by Kimberly Ann Priest, released by [Pank] Books in 2020.
Content warning for pedophilia
my pedophile prefers my Motown cds
if he decides it is not the same as decision // not a synonym for pushing my dreams // not file card / flip chart / or free stuff // but the slap down of lyrics on a cold floor / tables and chairs // silverware matching my outfit and dressing me down with its praise // transactions on que cards and somebody yelling as the line out the door grows insane with strangers / strippers// the over-elite // a microphone slithers into this sequined night // all thigh / all shoulder / no cheese // sneeze // go baby / go baby / go baby / go // Milburn / Smokey / Gaye discovered if I ask the bartender questions // discography if anyone suggests this a fling
Kimberly Ann Priest is the author of Slaughter the One Bird, finalist for the American Best Book Awards, as well as chapbooks The Optimist Shelters in Place, Parrot Flower, and still life. Winner of the New American Press 2019 Heartland Poetry Prize, her work has appeared in North Dakota Quarterly, Salamander, Slipstream, The Berkeley Poetry Review, EcoTheo, Borderlands and other journals. She is an associate poetry editor for the Nimrod International Journal of Prose and Poetry and assistant professor at Michigan State University.
