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Date: Tue, 05 Mar 1996 17:48:18 +0700
From: Khairyl Yassin
Subject: A Knife -- a poem dedicated to Suzanne Vega, by Khairyl Yassin.

A Knife (for Suzanne)

You slice, you dice
a knife straight out
of nasty infomercials.
Serrated or smooth,
you narrate with such precise
intuition, you irritate
and soothe. Cutting through metal,
scraping skin, bone.

You tone your words
as if they were muscles.
You expose the veins, marrow,
you throw the fat. Your pose
is that of a fragile waif. Little
did they know.

You may be dangling
from a black leather string
like designer jewellery,
blunt, harmless-looking.
But try to look away.

Those are slices of our lives
on a silver plate. Intricate
sacs, a dried up blood orange,
flawed yet triumphant.
They are fragrant.

Khairyl Yassin
Kuala Lumpur, March 1996

From: "Bob King"
To: undertow@law.emory.edu
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 1996 08:31:02 +0000
Subject: Re: A Knife -- a poem dedicated to Suzanne Vega, by Khai

Khairyl -- This is just tremendous. Thanks for sharing it with the rest of us. I especially love the line "But try to look away" (it sums up a great deal that I can't express) and that whole last verse.

I've written poetry on a number of topics, but I think writing about Suzanne would be too daunting. I fear that her poetry would cut mine to ribbons.

-- Bob

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