Spotlight Poet: Nicole Sealey

Underperforming Sonnet Overperforming
————–FOR MARILYN NELSON

This poem, this time, is the best idea /
I’ve ever had—the best in history /
even, the best any has had, I swear… /
and, I should know, I’ve kept inventory /
of them all; this poem is the alpha, /
omega, filler, and the laterals, /
literally the conceit of a far /
off blank stare or a volta with virile /
tendencies to talk about it and be /
about it (it being the best sonnet /
to ever sonnet—formal guarantees /
of a good time, ready rhymes, and, I bet, /
this poem is, with enormous success, /
the only poem entirely imageless). /

Unfurnished /

Something was said and she felt /
a certain way about said something. /
—————————————–Certain only /
because there was no mistaking the feeling /
she felt—the sound empty makes inside /
———–a vacant house. /

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Nicole Sealey, born in St. Thomas, U.S.V.I. and raised in Central Florida, is a Cave Canem graduate fellow and Hedgebrook alumna. A finalist for the 2011 Third Coast Poetry Prize, her poems have appeared in or are forthcoming to Callaloo, Harvard Review, and Third Coast, among others.