Our featured poem for this week appeared in the Fall Issue. It’s by California poet, Kat Lewis.

Sully’s Hair  

The scent of honey drops swirled in milk
billowed from perfect waves of brown hair.
I always tried to convince myself
that Sully’s hair was the color of raisins,
greasy paper bags, or shit, but underneath
all my internalized lies, I knew that it was brown
like hickory, like Devil’s food cake, whiskey,
or grizzly fur. Like my father’s baby grand,
the butt of revolvers. In my boarding school days,
I dragged my fingers through the knots
in her Maker’s Mark locks, and held
the straightener there until I smelled the hair burn.
Even the smoke streaming from the strands
smelled like honeycombs.

 – Kat Lewis
 Berkeley, California