This selection, chosen by guest editor Shlagha Borah, is from The Convert's Heart is Good to Eat by Melody S. Gee, released by Driftwood Press in 2022.
Mother Tongue
1.
A chrysalis vibrates in you
but will not erupt wings.
Your teacher thinks
the butterfly is coming
any day now. I tell you
the child’s name.
Your chrysalis says impossible.
You learn to call her something
else. Your mouth
an utter betrayal.
2.
A surgery will untie
the infant’s tongue so she
can milk.
A mutilation for
unfettered quenching.
3.
A caterpillar’s DNA does not
exit the cocoon. Wings form
from the soup of the old body.
The shell carries a name.
But what do we call
the cauldron inside?
4.
In every throat the passage for air
closes when food nears.
We cannot consume and
respire, we cannot take in
all at once.
5.
Wings heave in brute escape
from the self-spun womb.
The new creature is not
a version. A few
nectared months,
a flight of milkweed,
a life.
6.
Not everything that trembles
your tongue or your throat
is a voice.
Melody S. Gee is the author of The Dead in Daylight (Cooper Dillon Books, 2016) and Each Crumbling House (Perugia Press, 2010), winner of the Perugia Press Prize. She is the recipient of Kundiman poetry and fiction fellowships, two Pushcart Prize nominations, and the Robert Watson Literary Prize. Her poems, essays, and reviews appear in Commonweal Magazine, Blood Orange Review, Lantern Review, and The Rappahannock Review. She is a freelance writer and editor living in St. Louis, Missouri with her husband and daughters.
Shlagha Borah (she/her) is a poet from Assam, India. Her work appears in Salamander, Nashville Review, Identity Theory, Longleaf Review, Variant Literature, Rogue Agent, and elsewhere. She is pursuing an MFA in Poetry at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and is an Associate Poetry Editor at Grist. She has received support for her work from Brooklyn Poets and Sundress Academy for the Arts. She is the co-founder of Pink Freud, a student-led collective working towards making mental health accessible in India.
Knoxville, TN—The Sundress Academy for the Arts is pleased to announce the guests for the September installment of our reading series, poets Liz Chang and Maya Williams. Join us on Thursday, September 21st at Pretentious Beer Co. from 7:00-9:00 PM for a reading followed by an open mic hosted by Shlagha Borah. Sign-up for the open mic begins at 7PM sharp and is limited to 10-12 readers.
Liz Chang’s poetry has recently appeared in Verse Daily, Schuylkill Valley Journal, Rock & Sling, Exit 7, Breakwater Review and Stoneboat Literary Journal, among others. Chang was 2012 Montgomery County Poet Laureate and her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her fourth published collection, Museum of Things, is available now from Finishing Line Press. Chang’s translation of Claude de Burine’s poetry is anthologized in Paris in Our View from l’Association des Amis de Shakespeare & Company. She is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Moravian University.
Maya Williams (ey/they/she) is a Black multiracial nonbinary suicide survivor who is currently the poet laureate of Portland, Maine. Eir debut collection Judas & Suicide was released in May 2023 by Game Over Books; eir second collection Refused a Second Date will be released in October 2023 by Harbor Editions. Judas & Suicide was selected as a finalist for the New England Book Award in July 2023. Maya was one of three artists of color selected to represent Maine in The Kennedy Center’s Arts Across America series in 2020. Maya was also selected as one of The Advocate’s Champions of Pride in 2022. You can follow more of their work at mayawilliamspoet.com
This event is brought to you in part by a grant provided by the Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry. Find out about the important work they do here.
Our community partner for September iis the YWCA Victim Advocacy Program. Founded in 1988, the YWCA Victim Advocacy Program (VAP) is the only community-based non-shelter program in Knox County, the only program with advocates in both criminal and civil courts, and the only program with bilingual/bicultural advocates (Spanish, English, Arabic, and French). The YWCA is an onsite partner at the Knoxville Family Justice Center. YWCA advocates are stationed at the Family Justice Center, in court, and out in the community. In 2015, the YWCA expanded services to offer community based advocacy in Anderson County. In 2018, services expanded to Roane and Loudon counties.
YWCA offers culturally-specific advocates for immigrant, refugee, LGBTQ+, Latinx, and African-American populations, as well as support groups in English, Spanish, and Arabic to women who have experienced domestic violence and to female family members. Although every domestic violence situation is different, victims/survivors may find it beneficial to talk about their feelings with others who are going through similar experiences. Led by trained facilitators, confidential support groups meet weekly and address a variety of issues related to domestic violence in a caring, nurturing environment. Find out more about YWCA’s Victim Advocacy Program here!
This selection, chosen by guest editor Shlagha Borah, is from The Convert's Heart is Good to Eat by Melody S. Gee, released by Driftwood Press in 2022.
Learn to Walk
Fawn, an open
meadow is spread
with harm.
Every clearing stir
twitches the ear,
the follicles cup
every rustle. Your abrupt
posture prepared
to spring. A life alert.
How fast blood
must pump to stay
this ready. Your body
enters the clearing
tracked and scoped.
And yet the clover.
The goldenrod. The flush
of acorns says surrender
your alarm.
Take your cover
with you. Your spots
have not yet darkened
into hide.
Melody S. Gee is the author of The Dead in Daylight (Cooper Dillon Books, 2016) and Each Crumbling House (Perugia Press, 2010), winner of the Perugia Press Prize. She is the recipient of Kundiman poetry and fiction fellowships, two Pushcart Prize nominations, and the Robert Watson Literary Prize. Her poems, essays, and reviews appear in Commonweal Magazine, Blood Orange Review, Lantern Review, and The Rappahannock Review. She is a freelance writer and editor living in St. Louis, Missouri with her husband and daughters.
Shlagha Borah (she/her) is a poet from Assam, India. Her work appears in Salamander, Nashville Review, Identity Theory, Longleaf Review, Variant Literature, Rogue Agent, and elsewhere. She is pursuing an MFA in Poetry at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and is an Associate Poetry Editor at Grist. She has received support for her work from Brooklyn Poets and Sundress Academy for the Arts. She is the co-founder of Pink Freud, a student-led collective working towards making mental health accessible in India.
This selection, chosen by guest editor Shlagha Borah, is from The Convert's Heart is Good to Eat by Melody S. Gee, released by Driftwood Press in 2022.
The Convert Receives the Sign of the Cross on her Feet
The immigrants’ daughter doesn’t know Easter
or egg hunts.
Someone cuts a starting line
ribbon to unleash the gatherers and she is washed
into the herd. She knows
she is supposed to seek.
No one has told her these eggs will not be
the raw, white ones
her dutiful mother tucked by the longbeans.
She doesn’t know to spot silver wrappings
or shiny plastics.
She is turned around, lapping a brick path with
her basket, some centerpiece
with dented floral foam still packed in the bottom.
She doesn’t notice others yanking at grasses
or parting bushes like curtains.
Her mother has taught her never to take.
To initiate her into mystery, the convert receives
the sign of the cross
on her eyes, her ears, her lips, her shoulders,
her hands, her heart. She replies
I am to every question.
Then her husband kneels
and thumbs a cross on each foot.
She cannot remember the priest’s words
for why but hears him call her catechumen.
Her feet, barely sandaled, receive their signs
on skin and bones.
The hunt stretches on and she knows much lies
beyond her, scattered and hidden, but also
nowhere. In the exit line, a smiling
host puts three bright eggs in her empty basket
and pats her shoulder.
Aisles pulse at communion.
The convert watches them open their hands
and mouths, how they vanish the wine
together. She wonders if
the sip stains the wafer before it melts,
if that steep is enough
to change the body’s contours
as it eases down to fill the fast.
Melody S. Gee is the author of The Dead in Daylight (Cooper Dillon Books, 2016) and Each Crumbling House (Perugia Press, 2010), winner of the Perugia Press Prize. She is the recipient of Kundiman poetry and fiction fellowships, two Pushcart Prize nominations, and the Robert Watson Literary Prize. Her poems, essays, and reviews appear in Commonweal Magazine, Blood Orange Review, Lantern Review, and The Rappahannock Review. She is a freelance writer and editor living in St. Louis, Missouri with her husband and daughters.
Shlagha Borah (she/her) is a poet from Assam, India. Her work appears in Salamander, Nashville Review, Identity Theory, Longleaf Review, Variant Literature, Rogue Agent, and elsewhere. She is pursuing an MFA in Poetry at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and is an Associate Poetry Editor at Grist. She has received support for her work from Brooklyn Poets and Sundress Academy for the Arts. She is the co-founder of Pink Freud, a student-led collective working towards making mental health accessible in India.
This selection, chosen by guest editor Shlagha Borah, is from The Convert's Heart is Good to Eat by Melody S. Gee, released by Driftwood Press in 2022.
The Convert Desires Her Way Into a First Prayer
Her mother’s first lesson
was chew your wants and spit
the pulp, grow skinny feeding
everyone else your flesh.
A heart’s cargo is sometimes oil,
sometimes crude. A spill can undo
the waterproof of any surface.
And still the diving birds must feed,
must point their beaks past the slick
that seals the cornea to eternal blur.
Does the Lord ask her what she wants
when he already knows its name?
Does he play these games to make her
ignorant tongue collapse?
A spill will always take a shape, a floating
map of damage. In the cleanup,
particles separate from the main
and cast out into fish
bellies and clam adductors.
What do you want me to do for you,
He asks. Her cargo is not
contaminate. Her answers clear water.
Let me oil. Let me wash.
Let me want with a full throat
even of hopeless warbling.
Let You do nothing about any of it.
Let each desire form in this mouth
whose teeth You have taken from me.
Melody S. Gee is the author of The Dead in Daylight (Cooper Dillon Books, 2016) and Each Crumbling House (Perugia Press, 2010), winner of the Perugia Press Prize. She is the recipient of Kundiman poetry and fiction fellowships, two Pushcart Prize nominations, and the Robert Watson Literary Prize. Her poems, essays, and reviews appear in Commonweal Magazine, Blood Orange Review, Lantern Review, and The Rappahannock Review. She is a freelance writer and editor living in St. Louis, Missouri with her husband and daughters.
Shlagha Borah (she/her) is a poet from Assam, India. Her work appears in Salamander, Nashville Review, Identity Theory, Longleaf Review, Variant Literature, Rogue Agent, and elsewhere. She is pursuing an MFA in Poetry at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and is an Associate Poetry Editor at Grist. She has received support for her work from Brooklyn Poets and Sundress Academy for the Arts. She is the co-founder of Pink Freud, a student-led collective working towards making mental health accessible in India.
This selection, chosen by guest editor Shlagha Borah, is from The Convert's Heart is Good to Eat by Melody S. Gee, released by Driftwood Press in 2022.
The Convert Learns to Play Hide and Seek
The convert hid within her grandfather’s
restaurant while her cousin hunted,
while their mothers fried in oil and sweet
and sour. When the convert’s parents
laid eyes on her they said, daughter, daughter.
They never played this game with her
because from daughter there is no hiding.
When the Lord walked in the garden calling
the pair from the trees, a game began.
Now the convert strains to find Him, fingering
her ripped places, stalking Him out of His
relentless camouflage.
The theologian says there is no faith
without separation. A ship will sink
under its own lighthouse.
Now the convert’s daughter is hiding from her.
The girl knows being found is the part
you wait for but is not the best part.
Tucked behind the restaurant’s lard buckets,
the convert heard the boy flushing
the usual traps and dark passages.
She entered a country where she thought
she could live. The writer says waiting is
etymologically related to vigor, to vigilance.
The convert seeks with bellows and stomps.
Her daughter’s laughs reveal her place
every time. Who can keep from saying here I am?
Melody S. Gee is the author of The Dead in Daylight (Cooper Dillon Books, 2016) and Each Crumbling House (Perugia Press, 2010), winner of the Perugia Press Prize. She is the recipient of Kundiman poetry and fiction fellowships, two Pushcart Prize nominations, and the Robert Watson Literary Prize. Her poems, essays, and reviews appear in Commonweal Magazine, Blood Orange Review, Lantern Review, and The Rappahannock Review. She is a freelance writer and editor living in St. Louis, Missouri with her husband and daughters.
Shlagha Borah (she/her) is a poet from Assam, India. Her work appears in Salamander, Nashville Review, Identity Theory, Longleaf Review, Variant Literature, Rogue Agent, and elsewhere. She is pursuing an MFA in Poetry at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and is an Associate Poetry Editor at Grist. She has received support for her work from Brooklyn Poets and Sundress Academy for the Arts. She is the co-founder of Pink Freud, a student-led collective working towards making mental health accessible in India.
Jendi Reiter’s third poetry collection, Made Man (Little Red Tree Publishing, 2022), skillfully explores the transmasculine identity through the lens of capitalist America and small town mentalities. Inherently a political text, Reiter dissects their own gender journey along with the state of our consumerist world today, such as asking the titular transfag in “Transfag Semiotics,” “Want to be understood? What are you, a beer commercial?” (116).
Reiter compares their gender journey to the everyday, beginning with one of the many “self-portraits” throughout the collection: “Self-Portrait as Pastry Box.” The stunning language of, “…see the red smash where tiered berries kissed the jostled lid” introduces readers to Reiter’s mind, transporting us to this pastry box home where knives are not taken in vain. The smallest of objects are turned into a playground of metaphors with their words. The last line of “Take the cannoli, broken for you” (3), as a reference to Communion, sets up a recurring theme of religion for the rest of the book, as well. While the author clearly has a complicated relationship to the church, the religion itself, and the imagery and verbiage from it, have stuck with them.
This is best seen subtly in poems like “Whistler’s The White Girl.” Lines like, “your red hair, that made your papa suspicious, that your mother pulled in pin-curls and bleached with lemon juice, is finally necessary for the composition” (23), evoke recognition in others who grew up in the church, especially from queer kids who didn’t quite fit the mold. While this poem is based on the painting of the same name by James McNeill Whistler, Reiter’s language is restricting in a way that rings true with a transgender boy being primped and posed by his family, a doll for Sunday morning church service.
In the very next poem, “psalm 55.21,” Reiter also tackles the feminist struggle within the Christian faith. The first line is a rewording of the actual psalm 55:21, changing the pronouns to feminine ones, written as, “her speech is softer than butter, but war is in her heart” (25). This original verse describes one’s two-faced nature— saying pretty words to your face, then later stabbing you in the back. This poem lists out creature after creature, gifted protections by god, then ends with, “But to the woman, only a tongue, like a cat licking her newborn into breathing, like a cat rasping the meat from a bone” (26). While this may seem like a resigned response to a sexism ingrained into women’s bodies, the poem’s opening verse alludes to the more hopeful view that something as simple as a tongue is capable of holding immense power. With just their words, women are capable of more than first expected.
Much of the collection seems to take on a more pessimistic tone, such as the most explicitly political poem in the book, “President Obama Gives a Tape Measure to the Admiral Who Killed Bin Laden.” The title alone tells a whole story, something Reiter proves themselves quite good at through the book. While the poem is a heavy criticism of the military, the scope feels very human. Pessimistic, yes—convinced that the military is such a part of America’s nature, the poem recognizes the humans at the heart of it all. The final line of the poem is a quote from Admiral William McRaven: “It had been a good night, and just for a moment we could laugh about it” (89). This quote elicits a mixed response, as on one hand, it can be seen as a bonding of this group that is forced to do such horrible things, coming together in a moment of joy. On the other, thinking of these people laughing after committing such atrocities makes readers have to sit with the reality of our present day, and let it horrify us as it has Reiter.
Made Man is not lacking in light, however, as moments of levity are interspersed throughout, such as in “93 Minutes of Darkness.” Readers are introduced to mundane “flour and mayonnaise kitchens” moments before dropping references to the “official sunshades” (69) schoolchildren use to cover their faces, or “the democratic maw of omnivorous Dagon” (71). While referencing the climate crisis and the end of our world as we know it, Reiter manages to create an image of a town that is still surviving, through it all. This sense of community is strong enough to dissuade the citizens in this piece from dread, and Reiter’s humor can’t help but do the same.
“Dreaming of Top Surgery at the Vince Lombardi Rest Stop”’s title proves Reiter’s skill with titles again, feeling like a text you could receive from a friend. The poem stems from a moment so simple, perhaps even disheartening, for one’s gender expression. What makes the message so heartwarming is Reiter’s word choice, granting readers with the image of “Walt Whitman unbuckles his big-‘n’-tall Levis at his eponymous urinal” (65). It all feels so hopeful, these references to “manlier” men, the masculine ritual of “mighty men drenching you in Gatorade that shocks you breathless like love?” (66).
Maybe hopeful is the singular best word to describe Reiter’s collection. While prone to believing the worst in mankind, stuck in torrid political spirals that nothing can get better, there is a heart in the middle of it all that hopes desperately it somehow can. Just maybe, with neighborly bonds and the cultivation of the next generation so often referenced in the form of Reiter’s own son, there could be a better future out there.
Izzy Astuto (he/they) is a writer majoring in Creative Writing at Emerson College, with a specific interest in screenwriting. When not in Boston for college, they live in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. His work has previously been published by Hearth and Coffin, Sage Cigarettes, and Renesme Literary, amongst others. He currently works as an intern for Sundress Publications, and a reader for journals such as hand picked poetry, PRISM international, and Alien Magazine. You can find more of their work on their website, at https://izzyastuto.weebly.com/. Their Instagram is izzyastuto2.0 and Twitter is adivine_tragedy.
The Sundress Academy for the Arts is excited to present “The Poetry of First Date Impressions,” a workshop led by Maya Williams on September 13, 2023, from 6-7:30 PM. This event will be held over Zoom. Participants can access the event at tiny.utk.edu/sundress (password: safta).
First impressions are fun to observe for their embodiment of awkwardness, the effect of imagery of first sights, and the setting of location that could either help or hurt a first meeting. This can especially be true in first date impressions whether you have experienced them, know you’re about to experience them, or heard of a person’s Bumble/Tinder/Hinge related befuddlement. This goes for romantic and platonic dates. Maya Williams will be using poems from their second collection Refused a Second Date, Khadijah Queen’s I’m So Fine, and Chen Chen’s Your Emergency Contact Has Experienced an Emergency to encourage participants to write and discuss the poetic devices of displaying first date impressions.
While there is no fee to participate in this workshop, those who are able and appreciative may make donations directly to Maya Williams via Venmo @MayaWilliams16, PayPal through mayawilliams16@gmail.com, or CashApp at $williamsmay13.
Maya Williams (ey/they/she) is a religious Black multiracial nonbinary suicide survivor who is currently the seventh poet laureate of Portland, Maine. Eir debut collection Judas & Suicide is available now via Game Over Books. Maya was one of three artists of color selected to represent Maine in The Kennedy Center’s Arts Across America series in 2020. Maya was also selected as one of The Advocate‘s Champions of Pride in 2022. You can follow more of their work at mayawilliamspoet.com.
This workshop is brought to you in part by a grant provided by the Tennessee Arts Commission. Find out about the important work they do here.
A lot of writers start these intros by saying they’ve been passionate about writing forever, penning stories since they were little. And I did author one serialized ghost story in the sixth grade, passing new chapters scrawled in my black-and-white composition notebook off to fellow classmates and even my teacher (who had no idea I was writing most of it under my desk during science and math.) But writing was never really a part of my life again until college.
I had room for an elective to put towards my English major and jumped at the chance to take Intro to Creative Writing. I started writing mediocre short stories about girls with missing fathers they still loved, abandoning mothers they never knew, and rollercoaster romantic relationships. I gave my leading ladies cool names with “main-character energy,” like Lou, Leila, Lyra, and Jo. And many of them smoked cigarettes, though I had never touched nicotine. I wanted them to be edgier.
But it was all a fraud. Every one of my characters could have easily been named Heather, letting myself bleed onto the page more honestly. My stories got decent feedback, but nothing remarkable. Then, I wrote an essay about my father—who, at that point, I hadn’t spoken to in a couple of years—and it was selected for publication in my college’s literary magazine. Several of my professors read it and told me that while my fiction was “good,” my non-fiction was better; I needed to tell my story.
I switched gears entirely, writing openly about a past I’d pushed deep, deep down to make room for the “normal” self I was trying to build at my elite undergraduate institution. I began writing about being born in a jail to a meth-addicted mother, spending years as the subject of an intense custody battle, visiting my dad in prison, and missing him all the time.
The next summer, I interned in criminal court in Manhattan because I thought I wanted to be a lawyer. Court was riveting, but most days I sat impatiently in those pew-like benches, eager to later splay out on a blanket in Washington Square Park with my notebook and a pen. I longed to be like Eileen Myles in Chelsea Girls or Patti Smith in Just Kids: cool, edgy, and pursuing an artistic dream. That summer, I decided that I wanted to be a writer and live in New York.
After graduating in 2019, I landed a sales job at an early-stage tech startup, reckoning it would be a stable way to sustain myself in my dream city. I traded Washington Square Park for Washington Heights.
A couple of years, a few small publications, and several Catapult (RIP) workshops later, I ended up at The New School, where I continued writing my own story and completed my MFA in Creative Non-Fiction in 2023. Still working at the tech startup, I’m finishing my memoir manuscript in my free time. Having recently served as a Non-Fiction Editor at LIT Magazine, I’ve fallen in love with the editorial side of the writing world too, and am so grateful for this opportunity to keep growing my editorial skillset at Sundress Publications.
Heather Domenicis (she/her) is an Upper Manhattan based writer and editor moonlighting at a tech startup. She holds an MFA from The New School in Creative Non-Fiction and her words appear in Hobart, JAKE, and [sub]liminal. Born in a jail, she is writing a memoir about all that comes with that. She sometimes tweets @heatherlynnd11.
This selection, chosen by guest editor Shlagha Borah, is from Unearthed by Federica Santini, released by Kelsay Books in 2021.
Unearthed
Can you unearth water? Make it raise from twisted veins
with forked rod, bifurcated tongue lapping
green lodes—attracted, slowly re-surfacing, re-versed
pattern of deep well digging itself
filling up
Can you unearth yourself, with long precise strides,
from heart and hearthstone? From well-established
lodes of running, retorted silver? Abandon
the silk and the thread, the headstone of
flame, the never-pronged path?
You, dappled seed, twisted rivulet seeking
the surface: where are you when nobody looks?
Federica Santini is a Professor of Italian and Interdisciplinary Studies at Kennesaw State University. Her scholarly work and literary translations have been published in numerous journals and volumes in the U.S. and Italy. Her own poetry and short fiction have appeared internationally in over 50 journals and anthologies. She has authored or co-edited six volumes, among which her monograph, Io era una bella figura una volta: Viaggio nella poesia di ricerca del secondo Novecento(2013), and the English language, annotated edition of I Novissimi. Poetry for the Sixties, with Luigi Ballerini (2017), as well as her poetry chapbook, Unearthed (2021).
Shlagha Borah (she/her) is a poet from Assam, India. Her work appears in Salamander, Nashville Review, Identity Theory, Longleaf Review, Variant Literature, Rogue Agent, and elsewhere. She is pursuing an MFA in Poetry at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and is an Associate Poetry Editor at Grist. She has received support for her work from Brooklyn Poets and Sundress Academy for the Arts. She is the co-founder of Pink Freud, a student-led collective working towards making mental health accessible in India.
