FreezeRay:  Poetry With A Pop
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Kim Marshall

Every Human Heart
                                                                                  "A black mirror, made to reflect 
                                                                                   everything about itself 
                                                                                   that humanity will not confront." 
                                                                                   — Dream from Sandman by Neil Gaiman


Most elegant, most decorative Corinthian, 
slipped from the pale hand as masterpiece.
His eyes were the votive offering,
reflecting nothing but slick, jagged hunger.

Horror on the page is a four-color process. 
Corinthian, Morpheus,
why white, why eyes, why rot, why dream
keys which can't turn locks on closet doors.

Lifetime within endless lifetime,
had I                                         created with his same illness?
nor he chosen to be born. 

We two had decided             somewhere, somehow, some time    
we didn't want                        to be unmade
either.                    


The Myth of Wonder

Each woman's story changes in the hands of
men. The lie in my origins was only 
in the retelling. Easier to believe 
I'd been born of Zeus

than raised from sand by my mother's prayer, her strength
to love me with a name. In your world, I learned
a woman's worth — to be super only if
she is a wonder.

I then understood the mantel of my new 
name, a title cast as long as the shadow
of your hiss, stories retold until we were
all islands, drowning.

In order to be a hero, you made for 
me a father, sprung me from his crown, but I
did not need his strength to learn my own. Mother
taught me how to swim. 


Born in Seoul, South Korea, Kim Marshall is a biracial poet who considers herself from a little bit of everywhere. (It seems to add mystery to her origin story.) She is a Cave Canem fellow and currently resides in DC. Her work has appeared in Multiverse and After Ferguson: In Solidarity.
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