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Charlotte Knight
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the poet
British-Ukrainian poet Charlotte Knight is a 2021 New Poets Prize winner, and was commended in the UK National Poetry Competition in 2019. Her work has featured variously in Magma, SPAM, Lighthouse Journal, Perverse and elsewhere. Charlotte is studying for a Masters at Goldsmiths College. Her pamphlet, Ways of Healing, will be published by Smith|Doorstop in June 2022.
the poems
[Insert Sappho Reference]
pour wine over this white goat
or like hunt me for sport oh baby
love a long fusillade of mistakes
burning holes in my new purple furs
love a frenetic chasing why do i have
four legs or love a fecund horn sounding
and me and my pheromones so very
tangible you can smell them
in the cheese like the things you awoke
in me your head a bunch of violets
my lap a goat’s lap can i collect this
as a sadness can i carry this hurt
in a basket specifically woven
for the occasion can i be exiled
is there an island for heartbroken
goats why am i bleating when i say
[insert sappho reference] i mean i get it
we have all loved somebody
with the knowledge that they won’t
love us back i mean i don’t get it
i am a goat why am i crying
Hell is Real
Travelling southbound on Interstate 71, motorists pass a sign which reads
HELL IS REAL. It stands in a plowed field and serves as a reminder to all
God-fearing farmhands that they must indeed fear God. I am not so easily
influenced, I could never be a farmhand for the Lord. In fact, I frequently
shoplift and have thoughts about holding hands with you in public spaces.
The HELL IS REAL sign is one of many roadside prophecies erected in the
midwest. Amongst others, there is Jesus Saves, Jesus save My Soul, I Need u Jesus.
I do not believe in Jesus, but I do believe in believing. And though I could
never be a farmhand for the Lord, I have to love Him. Look at all the signs
He gave us.
Singing Before I Drown
in a River in Denmark
mermaid-like and incapable
of my own distress i collect
flora from the riverbank
looting a natural ecosystem
hoping to one day be framed
in gold
i carry my losses with me
every flower a symbol
how foxgloves are death
how cattails innocence
how pansies are love
in vain
how you you held me
always obscured
in dark corners
like with nature
how easy to say
we are separated
tall grass
wildflowers
no waves
no waves
a tributary husband
we were subject
to bursting banks
breaking boughs
overseas
mad with grief
singing for you
till my muddy death
how easy to say gone
Publishing credits
[Insert Sappho Reference]: runner-up in the
Outspoken Prize for Poetry (Page category)
Hell is Real: Ink Sweat & Tears
Singing Before I Drown in a River in Denmark:
Neutral Spaces (Issue 2)