a found poem: L.M. Montgomery’s Emily of New Moon
I was alone
when a torn coward
of a storm—
an underhanded mad priest—
burst over the night
and said
it had to smash me
to pieces.
So it worried at me
like a bad quarrel—
I just couldn’t
stand the worst of it.
It hid the courage
and sleep
I wanted, broke
my quick glass beauty
then said it was not bad
I was waiting
to die now—said
that this
was a strange blessing
I just had to bear.
Nazifa Islam is the author of the poetry collections Searching for a Pulse (Whitepoint Press) and Forlorn Light: Virginia Woolf Found Poems (Shearsman Books). Her poems have appeared in Gulf Coast, The Missouri Review, Smartish Pace, The Believer, RHINO, and Beloit Poetry Journal among other publications. She earned her MFA at Oregon State University. You can find her @nafoopal.