Malaika King Albrecht is the Featured Poet of the month of Novemer, 2011. I first met Malaika in a NCWN Conferene Master Class, "Line Dancing" taught by Kathryn Stripling Byer. Malaika is a serious young poet with publications in magazines and anthologies to her credit. She is the author of a chapbook poetry collecitons and two recent full length collections. Congratulations to Maliaka King Alrecht in this her birth month. She one of our most shining stars out of North Carolina at this time.
If you like these poems, let me know and I will pass the word on to our poet of the month, or you can leave a comment for her yourself.
Thank you for reading. --Nancy Simpson
If you like these poems, let me know and I will pass the word on to our poet of the month, or you can leave a comment for her yourself.
Thank you for reading. --Nancy Simpson
3 poems by Malaika King Albrecht upcoming from Press 53 book
How to Walk Right Through a Woman
I can’t remember the curse that made me
invisible. I only know that one day
he held my hand and then another,
my hand slipped through his like sand.
I stayed in the room, an empty vase
in the dark and not even moonlight could find me.
He may have sensed my presence
as he stepped around me and around me
packing his books, clothes, toothbrush.
By morning he could walk right through
as if I were an open window,
a door, the immaterial air.
High tide reveals
in every beginning,
an end.
The sea asks, How strong
will you stand? Rises and falls
all around you.
No matter where
we die, we’re buried
at sea.
Once my daughter nearly drowned
blue lips and
the sound of waves
inside her chest.
Cut adrift,
we clung to a hospital bed
for three days until she
thrashed ashore-
said I want to go home.
II.
She finds a whole
sand dollar in the surf,
places it in my palm. Don’t
lose it, mommy. Squeeze tight.
I say No, it will break.
How to teach her
that a fist
is how life catches us
in the jar of our own desire
to hold, to count
what we think is ours.
I show her, Hold your hands
with the sand dollar
between your palms.
Like we’re praying, she says
walking gently back to shore.
published in Asheville Poetry Review
The Dusting
Every body wants. The tongue licks
that last hint of sugar from lips.
Fingers rub satin clean from the blanket’s edge.
The soles of our feet sink into earth until the air
carries the odor of crushed grass.
Everyone wants more. The eyes
of the dying are wide open. The mouths
of the dying are wide open. The nostrils. The ears.
The hearts incessant: More. More.
Listen. A dark song folds the night clouds
into a clap of thunder. I will die.
There will be nothing
left but a wisp of smoke rising
from my open mouth like a Satin moth
wheeling towards the slow turning-
a kiss of white wing dust on my lips.
Every body wants. The tongue licks
that last hint of sugar from lips.
Fingers rub satin clean from the blanket’s edge.
The soles of our feet sink into earth until the air
carries the odor of crushed grass.
Everyone wants more. The eyes
of the dying are wide open. The mouths
of the dying are wide open. The nostrils. The ears.
The hearts incessant: More. More.
Listen. A dark song folds the night clouds
into a clap of thunder. I will die.
There will be nothing
left but a wisp of smoke rising
from my open mouth like a Satin moth
wheeling towards the slow turning-
a kiss of white wing dust on my lips.
Malaika King Ablrecht's newest book Spill was also published by Main Street Rag. Her poems have been published in many literary magazines and anthologies and have recently won awards at the North Carolina Poetry Council, Salem College and Press 53. She’s the founding editor of Redheaded Stepchild, an online magazine that only accepts poems that have been rejected elsewhere. She lives in Pinehurst, N.C. with her family and is a therapeutic riding instructor.
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