Jordan E. Franklin (she/her) hails from Brooklyn, NY. She received her MFA from Stony Brook Southampton and is a doctoral candidate at Binghamton University. She is the author of the poetry collection, when the signals come home (Switchback Books), and the chapbook, boys in the electric age (Tolsun Books). Her work has appeared in Breadcrumbs, Frontier, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, the Southampton Review and elsewhere. She is the winner of the 2017 James Hearst Poetry Prize and the 2020 Gatewood Prize.
1: poet discusses how she inherited the new world
“Ah fear, fear, she's the mother of violence
Making me tense to watch the way she breed”
- Peter Gabriel
Question: How were you able to survive for so long?
I come from a long line of folks who kept shotguns
behind their fridge. They couldn’t be shadows
because they were too long, too dark. Love was brief,
left holes in our walls. I could’ve reached
the gun if I tried. My fingers were slim enough,
long enough but Dad said I was too little then.
Worried about the kickback. He taught me how
to use a gun before I bled. I was born among knives:
me, a C-section spilled onto a hospital bed. Dad kept
them sharp throughout our apartment, tucked away
in drawers, closets. I wasn’t supposed to make it
but he insisted. To truly live, you need to sleep
loaded. Safety off, I can hurt. I can aim,
squeeze the trigger. I can reach your bleeding heart.
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Torch Literary Arts is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats.