Chryss Yost


Ornamented


What have I clutched
in my hand?
My ring a tiny book
open. Its spine
and my fingerbone
point to the same
precipice.
My fingers coil in.
Part of me anemone.

What have I spit
back into the world?
I am a bank
and a prison
and will free everything
I hold
like a dandelion
casting its lot
with the future.



Chryss Yost is the author of Mouth & Fruit and two chapbooksShe is co-editor of Gunpowder Press in Santa Barbara, where she served as Poet Laureate from 2013-2015. Her work has been widely anthologized. 

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Spring 2021