Poetry by J.L. Moultrie

      Stephen A Wolfe CC




sentinel
 
     
  
frozen in amber her funeral held no answers my four faces were graceless strangers to candor i
                                               don’t know how she handled me  
               or what took place after i was stranded annually living in project  
apartments she spoke casually & enjoyed her small garden 

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knight



i can get out of the way my grandmother disappeared inside of my face
                                             the pain wasn’t instant in my family are many women 
my mom found god in a prayer circle with her sisters 
                                             who spoke as if this weren’t a foxhole the moon gleamed like 
               cinders in my throat i listened to the national barricaded my 
               door i was deeply irrational late blooming exhaled 
                                                                            hours later standing in flowers    

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​hibiscus



                             blood’s in the sink feeling climbs to the surface of me haggard 
& searching it’s 8pm & i haven’t eaten the water’s up to my 
                                            knees my teeth have never been whiter dad burned 
                             plastic off copper wires in the alley fire confined to rusty 
barrels impaled by ideas narrow beginnings
                grinning in photographs





J.L. Moultrie is a Detroiter and multi-genre writer who communicates his craft through words. He hasn’t been the same since encountering Joan Didion, Jack Kerouac & James Baldwin. He considers himself a modern, abstract imagist.
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