“Jessica Jordan’s poetry explores the dark nature of humanity, as well as the commonality between human instinct and animal instinct. Jordan navigates through several diverse topics rotating around the popular topics humanity discusses, including the existence of god or gods, life in a small town, zombies, and the complex meaning of tattoos.
Jordan exposes the undertones of humanity while crafting beautiful images through the use of the senses, as in her poem ‘June 12, 2010.’ Jordan’s poem is written in the form of a cento, in which Jordan stitches together lines from other writers to show the spectrum of human cruelty as the poem discusses rape and the violation of such a horrendous act.
‘I did not die – the bile of desolation in every pore.’ These closing lines of ‘June 12, 2010’ shows the violation and despair that is left in the wake of abuse, leaving the reader, like the speaker, with the knowledge of violation but with the simple fact that the speaker of the poem did not die. Jordan makes apparent the desolation the speaker is feeling by saying, ‘A piece of burned meat wears my clothes, speaks in my voice.’ This is a striking image that shows the reader the complete despair the speaker is feeling, but also this cold detachment of being ‘burned meat.’
JFR Blog 