The World Is Round: Poems

Title Page, Copyright, Dedication, Quote

The World Is Round Also by Nikky Finney The Ringing Ear: Black Poets Lean South (edited anthology) Heartwood (short-story collection) On Wings Made of Gauze Rice Head Off & Split Foreword by Kevin Quashie triquarterly books/northwestern university press evanston, illinois the nikky finney world is round poems TriQuarterly Books Northwestern University Press www.nupress.northwestern.edu Copyright © 2013 by Nikky Finney. Foreword copyright © 2013 by Kevin Quashie. First edition copyright © 2003 by Lynn Carol Nikky Finney. First published in the United States in 2003 by InnerLight Publishing. This edition published in 2013 by TriQuarterly Books/Northwestern University Press by arrangement with Nikky Finney. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Finney, Nikky. [Poems. Selections] The world is round : poems / Nikky Finney ; foreword by Kevin Quashie. p. cm. “First published in the United States in 2003 by InnerLight Publishing. This edition published in 2013 by TriQuarterly Books/Northwestern University Press by arrangement with Nikky Finney.” ISBN 978-0-8101-5233-5 (pbk. : alk. paper) I. Quashie, Kevin Everod. II. Title. PS3556.I53W67 2013 811.54—dc23 2013002126 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1992. For the tenderhearted insurgent Lorraine Hansberry, who “finished my thoughts” long before I had them You might think that a straight line is the shortest distance between two points but a woman’s eye can travel in a curved line when she needs to see something and somebody is trying to keep her from seeing it, her eye can travel in a curved line to get there and she will get there. —modjeska simkins ...