Amber Atiya
Art by Chris Costan
Chris Costan, It's Vocal, 2022
found objects, thread, chain novelty trim, 9 X 4 X 13 inches
Chantel’s got no eyes, nose and mouth
half as full as mine, head and neck
on a nightstand. In another country, a woman
with slightly more body than Chantel
is placed in a basket and carried to market.
I missed half the documentary—she wore
a septum ring, bathed in a rusted bucket
by elders. No arms but her teeth were
the whitest I’ve seen, the sky above her village
a cyanotype of clouds. In New York City
a slight limp means carnival music trolling you
the rest of your days. I was destined to be
the inverse of a constellation, clever with scars,
imagine in a past life, learning to speak English
my body leaked propane. Imagine I steered clear
of the sun. Unlike the child born with the trunk
of Ganesh, the folk did not walk miles to worship
my peeling nape. In this life what else
can an untouchable do but command an army
of wigs to defend the virtue of her wounds?
Chris Costan, Scrape, 2022
found objects, thread, silk velvet base, 10 X 13 X 13 inches
Knock knock Epipen
femme, hey fellatio
hog, orange you prosperous
hustling albuterol
to the wretched wheezing their
way through Mary J Blige?
Knock knock real love
lashes long as hypo
dermic needles.
Orange you glad
to OD on your own bowl
no bulimic
threatening to heave
her quesadilla outside
the shelter restroom?
You wash your left side
with your left hand
with your right swat flies
homing on bras, air
drying on a rack, knock knock
says the fly
on your headwrap.
Bulimics leave the best
gifts says the fly
on your nipple. Orange
you the spitting image
of a thrift store pendant
abuzz with nakedness?
You who kill flight
collect wings and legs
into petals of tissue.
Knock knock trauma pigeon
toed as MJB.
Orange you a lewd
haiku slipped into the flute
holes of a stolen cane?
Chris Costan, Head Roll, 2022
found objects, unspun cashmere, glass base, 9 X 9 X 9 inches
You trample mums that can't be
plucked and sold in semi dark
ness to your right a rainbow
split its seam, a landslide
of bras femme up a peach
stupefied in juice, a colony
of pharaohs worship
here then vanish
into spalted oak.
Feel for the Wild
Turkey behind two tarot
decks. Knock a Martian
fruit off the shelf
hairy knuckle of kiwi
camouflaged among jasper
rocks. If you want that mug
of tea, quit playing
soldier, turn up
the goddamn light.
You've earned chamomile
and bourbon, suffered the caw
of omens cast by a bird
you hear but never see
like the late Raven who
raised you slamming doors
slipping cloves in toilet water
shaking a maraca of pain
killers, the Reaper’s rattle
primitive as birdsong.
Amber Atiya
Amber Atiya, a supportive housing and women’s rights advocate, is a multidisciplinary poet from Brooklyn. Dig on her poems in the Soul Sister Revue Poetry Compilation, Boston Review, Gulf Coast, and elsewhere. Her visual and text-based art/objects have been exhibited at the Knockdown Center, Bessie’s Brooklyn, and Pace University. A 2021 recipient of the Oscar Williams and Gene Derwood Award, she is a member of a women of color arts collective celebrating twenty years in 2022. Her chapbook, the fierce bums of doo-wop, was published by Argos Books.
Chris Costan
Chris Costan has had solo exhibitions at Germans Van Eck Gallery, Windows on White Street, Avenue B Gallery, F.A.O. Gallery, Cheryl Pelavin Fine Arts (all in New York); Smith College Museum of Art (Northampton, MA); and Peter Miller Gallery (Chicago). She has been awarded grants from the Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation, NYFA, American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Her exhibitions have been reviewed in ARTnews, Artforum, Flash Art, New York magazine, and other publications. Costan lives in New York City and spends time in the Hudson Valley.