"Hurricane Isabel, 2003," "Tangled," and "Metronome"

Hurricane Isabel, 2003

Moon light slinks through the curtains
through the boarded up windows
the spaces between spread fingers
and laced legs
as an emergency radio statics into the darkness.

The rhythm of bodies
playing shadow puppets
in the accidentally romantic candle light
matches perfectly with the silence of the eye.

He gasps
the intake a wind risin’ to fuck the hurricane

then a drizzle hits the windows
and the storm whips the trees.

 


 

Tangled

Coffee skin glows in the dark
I drink it like I need to wake up.
You play between my legs pianist fine notes
that vibrate in my vocal cords.
My nails dig into your back searching for diamonds
love, I gravitate towards your scent in the night,
a sunflower following you across the bed.
Your tongue is an oyster rolling a pearl around its shell,
each finger, a serpent curling around my breast.

Leave rose gardens across my skin
planted with your teeth.
Tangle yourself in my limbs
I’ll release you in the morning.

 


 

Metronome

There are praline crumbs in my tear ducts
when I wake up in the morning,
magnolia petal finger nails
graze molasses skin and get stuck.

He tells me my thighs are sweet potatoes
hanging from my hips
and that when we have sex, the taste
is cinnamon and cane sugar.

I stick my entire body to his skin
his hair smells like a storm is coming.
As my fingers play in the ravine on his back
my body rattles like thunder beating a windowpane.

Somewhere outside, a horn is singing to the sun
while double-dutch ropes metronome in the background.

 

 

Kayla Rodney

Kayla Rodney, a New Orleans native, has been studying and writing poetry for the last fifteen years. She’s a graduate of Lusher Charter High School, Xavier University of Louisiana, San Diego State University, and recently received her Ph.D. from the University of Florida. After being displaced due to Katrina, and then later migrating to different cities for her education, she felt a pull to write about home and the tremendous power of community, landscape, family, and water. Her first book is Swimming Home (Unlikely Books, 2020).

 

Edited for Unlikely by Jonathan Penton, Editor-in-Chief
Last revised on Monday, November 20, 2017 - 22:14