A Poem by Juniper Jordan Cruz

Author: Poetry Editor

June 6, 2017

This week, a poem by Juniper Jordan Cruz.

 

Monstro, The Terrible Dogfish

 

White lover,
there nothing this poem can give me
that you haven’t fucked me into: something

large and blue              for you

to press inside,                 a lie

erecting. Once,

I told you to leave. But,
what is permission but
a song curling inside me
and onto you?

What is my song,
but a heaven heaving
above you? And

even beached, I

let love

stiffen you into
a real boy and

you learned

how to make love
by leaving

me behind.

——

JUNIPER JORDAN CRUZ is a QPoC poet and undergraduate student at Kenyon College. She is the winner of the 2017 Gigantic Sequins Teen Sequins Contest for the 19 year old age group and the Academy of the American Poets Prize for undergraduate students. Her work has been published in The Atlantic, The Academy of the American Poets, and a number of other publications.