I.S. Jones
Bed Bug
nothing like waking up / to bedbugs / to remind you / your blood / still comes from a wrathful god / or a petty one / today i crushed the invader / watched its blood / set into a crescent moon / tore the small beast from tusk to tail / its blood some of my blood / its flesh rough / not unlike my own / i killed it / despite its brief rule over my body / i killed it to prove / i wasn’t small myself / despite the truth / that both of our bodies / speak in platelets / red lullabies / how our bodies come alive / mine from an unearthly glow / yours in the heavy night / you roam / your fangs dragging across my skin / i sleep despite invasion / despite the ghosts / making me / into a fun house / i wake to raided skin / a ransacked body / you / did you see me / cower before you / before wrath / a face: one moon with two phases / did you see me / before i sent you packing from yourself / god that i am / how i kneel before You
after Elizabeth Spire’s “The Snail”
I.S. Jones is an American-Nigerian poet, educator, and music journalist from Southern California by way of New York. She is a fellow with BOAAT Writer’s Retreat, Callaloo, and is a Graduate Fellow with The Watering Hole. Jones is Assistant Editor at Voicemail Poetry as well as Managing Editor at Dead End Hip Hop. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Rumpus, The Harpoon Review, The Blueshift Journal, SunDog Lit, Matador Review, great weather for MEDIA, The Offing, Anomalous Press, The Shade Journal, Puerto Del Sol, Nat.Brut, and elsewhere.
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