Madame Deluxe (National Poetry Series)

Tenaya Darlington, Madame Deluxe, is a truthsayer with attitude and an agenda to boot. She’s a charmer, an alarmer, a kick in the pants, a hoot…it’s heartening to know what poetry can still do.—Lawson Fusao Inada

Madame Deluxe is all things loud and leopard print. Inspired by years of watching drag shows, Darlington evokes a persona who wanders the periphery of femininity. Striking out against artifice, staging her own myth, Madame Deluxe is a she-male Vesuvius.

Tenaya Darlington is the managing editor for Beloit Fiction Journal. Her work has appeared in Scribner’s Best of the Fiction Workshops 1998 and In Brief: Short Takes on the Personal. Madame Deluxe was selected by Lawson Fusao Inada for the National Poetry Series. Darlington lives in Madison, Wisconsin.