Kristin Garth

 

after Us Weekly

Three centuries pass before she is asked
to unfasten the slight skull which serves as
its clasp.  It’s sculpted of jade.  Thousands bask
at this bag’s fine details, eyeballs topaz,
never divining entrails. Until a
chance encounter on the New York subway,
a bobbed snob in Chanel offers to pay
her to sit for a fashion shoot, display
its lining of coquelicot jacquard.
Inhabitants leap, scurry out, some hirsute,
some spindly, brown.  Ascent is not hard
up pant cuffs of a photographer’s suit.
Swollen, vintage venom, they’re ready to curse
all who dare ask a witch what’s in her purse.

 

Kristin Garth is a Pushcart, Rhysling nominated sonneteer and a Best of the Net 2020 finalist.  Her sonnets have stalked journals like Glass, Yes, Five:2:One, Luna Luna and more. She is the author of 21 books of poetry including Crow Carriage (Sweet Tooth Story Books) and The Stakes (Really Serious Literature) and the editor of seven anthologies. She is the founder of Pink Plastic House a tiny journal and co-founder of Performance Anxiety, an online poetry reading series. Follow her on Twitter:  (@lolaandjolie) and her website kristingarth.com