Can’t spell Triflant. Where U From?

The flouted face of red
The bounty
Tip-toeing past my love in the tower
Because I reek of regalia
You better be spitting out that jalapeno blue tongue of yours
On the belly of the world
On the shin

If you don’t go my way
Find the jewel between your legs and swamp walk the rivers
Sit and drool
Bitch and moan about the situation that might be life
A diagnosis of close to trifilant
And trifilant night

Beautiful black girl
Did you see that man in the mirror
His shadow fed you chicken one night

And you forgot your face on the table
Formidable night
Forgettable stranger
Hungry stable and fat for the skinny bitches to laugh at
I was born ready for armageddon
I sleep with two legs.

Back with a candle, mom
Back with your back to crack, sexy
Back with the floundered fish fry fertile for mercury on the tongue of an America with Blue
shoulders- Just to repeat myself
And just because i can’t
The rules I’ve eaten for writing say
Never repeat
Never repeat

For the woman
And red hymened men
Said theyll throw you in the pile
Alright- I deserve to be there
But upon reflection
I think we all deserve more

somehow unafraid of writing the longest line
Bridging my blackness with the sound of clipping wings for breakfast
Bleaching my darkspots careful of my skin
We need not to be seen when we don’t know love
But I do, but its everywhere so it’s hard to put on paper

Like when someone asks a question and your whole body has an answer
The swimming number in the back of her foot

The anklet ash leaving the ring burgundy
But wouldn’t you say ruby
No, I say blood for no anguish
Burn your fire for no witness
Eat your heartache for the eleventh time
A beautiful dark melody
A nonchalant poem from a tall girl with short hair
Blazé for the sade, lopsided hiding, breathing, pouting, shooting, crying, dashing, dying range of
arms that do not bear fruit

Say it with me
Even in love,
Arms don't bear fruit

I salute the earth when it threatens to swallow me
Hollow me out and call me brownskined malady

The rippling body of a crippled newspaper
In the hands of a hand

Forget poetry
Lets write a book

Death’s Affirmation

Will you remember me when I am ash?
When you can no longer taste my hair in your soup…

I have fallen, on the bus ride and stayed in one place
An honorable death, I’d say.

Will you remember me when I am figment
An illustration, a cause for celebration however small
The dark chocolate in your back pocket as you sigh and say
She wouldn’t have settled for just one piece

No.

I will be remembered and stricken with good spice and cold tears
No one wearing black because I am black and I don’t want you to crowd me as I lay

So old fashioned. So normal. Why can’t I stand?
Yeah I understand the challenges, but why can’t you make it so I can stand?

If you told me how much you loved me
The last thing I would do is lay down.

Night swimmer

We’re allergic to the shore
Nightswimmer, unabashed blues
Leaking into wet suit no accident
By design 
We swim, fly, dive, break, dance under the water
Amidst the flora fauna found freeloading firefly sweat
Sweet aura of unidentified animals 
Is a fish even an animal?
The bigger you are the more insect like
Something about believing you are right
Regardless 
Of whether or not you re wrong, 
Mistaken
Bullied by your own brain 
Dizzy on the dock awaiting dinner
But you eat them 
So you respect them while they're your friends
Like a coworker under the water, you don’t
Even pollinate, just slimy for popularity reasons

And we wonder, why the nightswimmer doesn’t 
Want to come back. 

Deja Carr is an artist and writer of Jamaican descent originally from New York, who currently lives in Amherst. She has been awarded by Harvard for activism in music, as well as City Space, the Wildflower Collective and others. Carr is the spearhead behind the project Mal Devisa, which is a songwriting, liberation, and poetry project.  Masterfully a genre-hopper, her work spans everything from soulful rock to unabashed hip hop, lush experimental to folk, lo-fi to jazz. Often accompanied by heavy bass, clever loops, and hard-hitting lyrics – her voice is unmistakable, yet versatile.