Edges, making a life
with knives. Each night,

the white rooms enclose spirits.
Curtains nod at shadows.

Wet midnight in those houses.
Upwind, the moon signal,

slip pity. Hear climbing
premonitions like burning teeth.

Edge magnetism attracting a violet.
Driven like axes, felled sound.

 

Source Text: Don Domanski. “The Rouged Houses.” All Our Wonders Unavenged. Second printing. London, ON: Brick Books, 2007.

Jessica Van de Kemp (BA, B.Ed, MA) is a 2014 Best of the Net nominee. Her poetry chapbook, Spirit Light, is the second release in a new series from The Steel Chisel. Her poetry appears most recently in: The Wayfarer, Hermeneutic Chaos Literary Journal, Naugatuck River Review, Written River, Vallum, Hello Horror, Unbroken Journal, Halcyon Magazine, and the Switch (the Difference) Anthology from Kind of a Hurricane Press. The recipient of a BlackBerry Scholarship in English Language and Literature and the winner of a TA Award for Excellence in Teaching, Jessica is currently pursuing a PhD in Rhetoric at the University of Waterloo. Website: jessvdk.wordpress.com & Twitter: @jess_vdk