Dehelixing Adora (A Colonial Madrigal)

by Paula Mendoza

A battery of violents, and still the heart

data proves inconclusive.

Do our deficients coerce? I malign

your sovereignty. Alas, my talon’s

no match for your drone.

Police the alleys in this speech.

My theory stiffens your discipline.

Slavishy, this thought pulverizes love

into something I can breathe.

I can’t breathe.

Mauger my dread, I convolute to you, sahib.

O, durable truth of my adoration!

Mistake me again, I am

ugly with lust.

This weeping is consensual.

Your episteme is my ontology.

I, island adjacent, of redoubtable

splendor. Dear pirate. Plunder.