This week's Poet of the People is Jessy Hylton. Jessy Hylton is a poet in every sense of the word, She comes to us with a wealth of experience and knowledge. She has her PhD in Creative Writing from LSU and prior to following her heart to South Carolina she was the MFA Director of Creative Writing at the University of Arkansas at Monticello and founding editor of Fermata Publishing. She hosts the Funky Fish Camp Reading Series in Georgetown, SC, is on the faculty at Coastal Carolina and is a vital and active member of the poetry community of South Carolina. She is an under-utilized literary force in South Carolina and I am blessed to know her..
Bio: Jessica K. Hylton holds a Ph.D. in creative writing from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and works at Coastal Carolina University. Her books include Gag Order, The Great Scissor Hunt, and the forthcoming collection Scatter; or, James Joyce Always Makes Me Think of Boobs. She is the program director for the Poetry Society of South Carolina and runs the Funky Fish Camp Reading Series at Between the Antlers in Georgetown.
I want to love you like a semi-colon loves
Not the unpc version Vonnegut espoused
or the social movement I agree with in sentiment
but not in punctuation
I want to love you linguistically
admiring the independence of your clause
the completeness of your phrase
and how it mirrors my own
Call it a homosyntaxity
Two bodies the same in structure
beautiful on their own accord
but breathtaking when together
I want to love you knowing you
don’t need me and I don’t need you
because we function well on our own
but when we’re close, we redefine mechanics
~~~
She uses commas combatively
Or at least that’s what I told her
When she let me read her writing
She liked it—a staunch feminist proud
of subverting the male standard
of academic discourse
But honestly?
Combative wasn’t the right word
She uses commas romantically
where she refuses to separate
things that are better together
like fish and chips, nuts and berries
even in lists where the separation
is grammatically correct
Collocation? Noun phrases?
The linguists I asked couldn’t tell me
what she was doing, but sometimes
you don’t need a linguist to know
all you want is to be on the same
side of a comma as she is
~~~
Apis Angel
Sometimes I wonder if bees
tell their larvae stories
about their prophet
The queen of the bees
crucified by scientists
in the name of learning
Does a savior have
to be self aware
when she's pinned
to a ragged old cross
or a Smithsonian cardboard display?
Can that awareness
be constructed as life
buzzes onward
triumphing over
plague after plague?
Is it so far fetched
to question an insect’s
knowledge of the universe
or to suspect something
might be studying us?
~~~
Pie Soporte
I watched you leave
with a woman whose
name I doubted you knew
as I turned to my own
brunette
Each of us going through
the motions—knowing
the rhythm of our vicious
courtship would pull
us back together
before the night’s end
Like two waves crashing
against your satin sheets
intent on annihilating
the pull of gravity
In the morning
you would leave again
for the tighter verses
of an older poet
Who phrased life
more beautifully than
she could live it
While I would look
for a liquid muse
waiting for our next
turn
~~~
Sante Sybil Sante
Lovers should come
with warning labels
like finely crafted spirits
(1) According to the Surgeon General
Women should not lose Lucidity
amid Clandestine promises
for risk of defective sentiment
(2) Consumption of poetry
impairs your ability to act
and may cause reality
to become closer
than it appears
So I’ll fill my glass
for you my dear
Dribbling water pure
as Ophelia over sweet
nothings that cloud
the clarity of Absinthe
~~~
He proposed to me on the same night
he showed me the scans
filled with spider webs
sticking to all of his internal organs
Not blessing them with words of encouragement
but with the promise of my first real tragic ending
“Marry me and give me something to live for”
I said I’d think about it but I ended
up with a felony—91 in a 55
on the only road away from death
I understand him so much more now
My brain littered with blotches
like wilted fireworks
Flies and the dying only want a soft place
to land always heading toward something
desirable hoping they won’t get zapped
But I know walking corpses have limited sex appeal
as I rot before you and I will shamble away
Rather than ever asking you to stay
~~~
Instruction manual
Do you ever wonder
if an instruction manual feels
sad as you turn its last page?
I promise I’m not high, or at least not
that high but it is legal
when you’re dying
I guess it’s supposed to make
you forget you’re on your last
page but really all it makes
you think about is how you
and the instruction manual
should have been novels
~~~
Things she doesn’t like
Ballpoint pens
Wet socks
Overly groomed flower arrangements
Water she can’t see through—unless it’s the ocean
Patriarchal ideals
Admitting favorites
Drinking wine out of plastic cups
Making all the decisions
Any decision that’s different than the one she would make
Left lane drivers
Driving in general
Not telling you how to drive from the passenger seat
Nicknames
Aluminum in deodorant
T shirts with logos
Jeans without belts
Chewing gum
Onions
Most old white men
Cold French fries
Feeling out of control
Indicas
Cheap beer
At this point, I lean back
clicking the ballpoint pen
I bought her and she gave back
to me as I reread the list
and fall in love with her all over
again because the world is better
when it spins the way she wants
But I know I still have to add
two more letters to make
the list complete, done, finished
I pick up the rejected gift
and add the two letters she never wanted
“Me”