POETRY SPOTLIGHT:
KYLE CARRERO LOPEZ

KYLE READS THREE POEMS

“INHERITANCE,” “UNTITLED (HAVANA 2000),” & “AMERICAN GHAZAL”

INHERITANCE

Not yet sundown and a plate dips 

from hand to hardwood, sharp whites burst

like new calla lilies, my gaze drops,

halts, finds my father 

in the floor’s pasture—

I once read narcissists can’t love their child 

as a separate, that they crane down and see extension, 

a blooming self/appendage—

and there, in the ivory wreck, 

I see: next to and of him, with him, me. I see.

Like shard spawn of cracked glassware, 

my breaks slide right into his. 

Each piece soon glides down the trash 

and fire pit croaks as it lands.

Kyle Carrero Lopez was born to Cuban parents in New Jersey. He is the author of the forthcoming chapbook MUSCLE MEMORY, winner of the 2020 [PANK] Books Contest. He co-founded LEGACY, a Brooklyn-based production collective by and for Black queer artists. Kyle’s recent poems are published in POETRY, The Nation, Bear Review, Frontier Poetry, and elsewhere.

Find him at kylecarrerolopez.com.

Note: Kyle’s poem “Inheritance” will be printed in the forthcoming Issue 68 of Great River Review.