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The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: Beautiful Machine Woman Language by Catherine Chen

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This selection, chosen by guest editor H.V. Cramond, is from Beautiful Machine Woman Language by Catherine Chen (Noemi Press 2023).

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{{ This unpromised afterlife.

What cannot be printed does not mean it cannot be spoken. Into literary triangles. So: here I am shouting }} Sometimes the woman is you. Sometimes the woman disappears slowly, over time, like satin slips like hair ties. Sometimes the woman is the melodies of Diana Ross that you mistake for maternal reassurance. Sometimes the utterance breaks down, or you will it down. Sentences trail. I listen to a clip on repeat to determine the worth of a sentence. Sometimes her worth is condensed to the size of: “You are dumb.” “You’re welcome slut.” Manners matter. She lunges after approval. In the dream crawling on all eights Lou mutters your name, your light          touch.

Catherine Chen is a multidisciplinary poet and performer. They have received fellowships from the Watermill Center, Theater Mitu, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (Arts Center Residency 2021), Lambda Literary, Poets House, and Franconia Sculpture Park. Their poems appear in The Rumpus, Hyperallergic, Apogee, Nat. Brut, among others. Chen is the author of the chapbook Manifesto, or: Hysteria (Big Lucks, 2019). They live in Brooklyn.

H.V. Cramond holds an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and was the founding Poetry Editor of Requited Journal for 10 years. In 2018, she helped pass the Survivor’s Bill of Rights in Illinois as an organizer for Rise. Read more of her writing on her website.

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