The Wardrobe's Best Dressed: Yearn by Rage Hezekiah

This selection, chosen by guest editor Tierney Bailey, is from Yearn by Rage Hezekiah, released by Diode Editions in 2022.

When You Bled Into My Uncle’s Bed Sheets

I pushed too deep or fingernail- nicked inside, we lied, said the blood was mine & monthly. You came hard & fast as always, in the Harlem apartment, deep red spreading like war. Your face a flash of shame, I never meant to harm or hurt you. Bloody bedding in the bath, I ran cool water over the stain. Pink liquid rimmed the drain, we whispered apologies to no one.

Rage Hezekiah is a Cave Canem, Ragdale, and MacDowell Fellow who earned her MFA from Emerson College. She is a recipient of the Saint Botolph Emerging Artist Award and she serves as Interviews Editor at The Common. She is the author of Unslakable (Paper Nautilus Press, 2019) and Stray Harbor (Finishing Line Press, 2019). Rage’s poems have appeared in the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day, The Cincinnati Review, The Colorado Review, and many other journals and anthologies.

Tierney Bailey is a Libra, a lover of science fiction and poetry, and is a dice-collecting gremlin. Currently, Tierney is Associate Poetry Editor with Sundress Publications, a copyeditor at Strange Horizons, Associate Editor with PodCastle, and a freelance graphic designer. She has earned a BA from the University of Indianapolis and a Masters Degree in Writing, Literature, and Publishing from Emerson College.