Khaty Xiong is the author of two poetry chapbooks, Deer Hour (New Michigan Press, 2014) and Elegies (University of Montana, 2013). Xiong’s work has been featured in The New York Times and Verse Daily, and Poetry Society of America. Her debut collection Poor Anima (Apogee Press, 2015) is the first full-length collection of poetry published by a Hmong American woman in the United States. More of her work can be found at khatyxiong.com. Currently, she resides in Gahanna, OH.
MORNING ABLUTION by Khaty Xiong
Tuesday, 05 April 2016
Salt heavy—my oxen skin overrun & ringing
Sunday plum—bodies whetted & sold in the East—
fruits without flowers—the winter prostitute
steel plowed—tender how she glows
as the ocean would have me losing ear & piece—
passage through veil—each tooth in place for feast
in the haunt of our Lord—so we bend—
fever in quarters—marred as the crown comes portal
—renewed vagina—the anus a master throat—
…debts I give back despite the dead—Cyclamen
without ascent—ascending bloom in gain
to lay waste—the sun landing
on every spider
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