“Multicolored Blood,” one of two poems by Juliet Cook in our Winter 2015 issue, was written during Ekphrasis at the Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio Poetry Association, led by Clarissa Jakobsons, and inspired by various abstract paintings and other art pieces.

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WHERE DO HER MISSING FINGERS LIVE?

Extracted from asylum tubes, re-shaped
into new modules with tiny insects
crawling out the mouth and growing,
glowing with dark shimmers.

These mouths are multicolored vessels,
some of them poisoned, some of them frozen,
some of them fresh but trapped.
Tiny red palpitations dangling
from the bottom of a stingray.
Bright red tissues dripping wet
confetti from abstract fetus, growing
into a horse throat cut.

It turns gelatinous and then skeletal.
A skull head with dark red painted
inside a purple casket sinking down
underwater and then swimming.

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JULIET COOK‘s poetry has appeared in many literary publications, including Arsenic Lobster, Diode, ILK, and Menacing Hedge.  She is the author of more than thirteen chapbooks, including POISONOUS BEAUTYSKULL LOLLIPOP (Grey Book Press, 2013), RED DEMOLITION (Shirt Pocket Press, 2014), a collaborative chapbook with Robert Cole, MUTANT NEURON CODEX SWARM (Hyacinth Girl Press, 2015) and a collaborative chapbook with j/j hastain, Dive Back Down (forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press in 2015). Find out more at www.JulietCook.weebly.com.