Alexandra Corinth, Intrigue

Alexandra, Princess of Greece and Denmark,
the last queen of Yugoslavia, never set foot in her adopted country,
bound to the exile she had known since birth.

Her legitimacy was muted aloud like a shift of sound to terror,
one more distant monarch admired as shining figure
like sunrise over a brook, babbling and haunted.

Alexandra was familiar with the abandon of sovereignty,
a vestigial organ all of her kingdoms saw fit to render in shadow
and so, she armed herself with means to emerge,
ways to mystify with favor and grace.

She scribbled gratitude in black ink,
details possessed and scoring, weapons to crush and carve.

History will eventually obscure the present,
stretch the source in its escape,
but will it confine her, the complex fettle of humanhood
that pushed her to the edge again and again?

Or will it reveal sustaining neglect,
devastated dynasties like gorge of grief,
a field of almost and too much and
never, never, never?

Alexandra Corinth is a disabled writer and artist based in DFW. Her chaplet, DEUS EX DIAGNOSI, was published by Damaged Goods Press in 2019. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Kissing Dynamite, Barren Magazine, Entropy, and SWWIM, among others. She is also an editorial assistant for the Southwest Review. You can find her online at typewriterbelle.com.