I don't want the sting of someone with a history
like my own. I don't want the other half of my knuckle bone.
The beloved is elastic, a switch for another shore,

my face on both sides of the drachma.
If only a god's tongue has no beginning or end,
what of the bones scored for the bonfire to read?

Even when I was young, I could move things
with my mind, wanted to be impervious
to fire, though now I love the days I scorch

my wrist & breath spasms in my throat,
telling me I am here in my 24th year
& joy is blistered before it is peeled.

Joy is pickling in a clay pot in the backyard,
brine smuggled from the mainland,
delicious because it smacks of what is left behind.

I seek bloodless pleasures. This cannot be impossible;
I am not comfortable with the question.
The potted flowers droop like the eye of the first boy

who wanted me—when he took me into the closet,
I saw the veil you speak of—& just behind it,
a girl dragging her spear like a steel tail.

Then I woke with all my hands & feet.
& to God knows where, I ran. 
from the journal SIXTH FINCH
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I wrote "Vinegar" in response to Anne Carson's conceptualization of eros as a triangle of self-beloved-lack. My own forays into eros exposed a kind of vacuousness within myself in which every face I adored pointed back to my own. Further, my investigations of desire always seemed charred with violence, and I began to wonder if it was possible for me to experience eros without blood. The question remains.
Cover of "Self-Portrait as Othello"
Jason Allen-Paisant Wins Forward Prize For Best Collection 

"An exhilarating and propulsive read that sweeps through several European cities that become subject to the black male gaze, changing what is seen and who is heard. Playful, intimate and allusive, these poems interrogate masculinity and history, experiment with the myth of Othello, mourn absent fathers, and offer us a refreshing mash-up of languages that regenerate poetry so that it feels freshly minted." 

via FORWARD ARTS FOUNDATION
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What Sparks Poetry:
Duy Đoàn on Language as Form

"The only fixed form I think I have ever wanted to understand is the pantoum. The fact that it's a Southeast Asian form really appealed to me. From what I know, it's an old Malaysian form. All of the lines are repeated once in a predetermined order. I've seen lots of variations when it comes to the order. The poet decides. These repetitions bring about a unique musical quality, which is one of the big draws of the pantoum. But the thing I like most about the form is its transparency."
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