I Will Never be Desensitized. Do not show me videos of My brother’s execution as though His death is some staged movie scene where Cut was called and he got up, brushed off and Headed home to reheat Monday’s Barbque His life is sacred to me I have washed him in his infancy Fought…
Category: Poetry
a tritina lullaby for mama
wide eyes take up doorways, begging me not to leave it’s not forever i chime but only goodnight near forgiveness, he is unconvinced but for his mother’s kiss this chair a portal and sleep’s sweet lingering kiss rest upon my eyes now panhandlers taking their leave a sleepless slumber my true reprieve on this goodnight…
favor in five courses
i. appetizer body of a child grown ripe from the lasciviousness of men past their prime judgement echoes of lies told millennia ago when the bristlecone pine was seedling language symbolic yet still a female could be taken against her will for the deceitful pleasure of males, justification lies in the fabrication of detail ii. soup how…
louisiana long green (a high yielding southern heirloom)
red and yellow, pink and green purple and orange and blue at 3 they sing of rainbows mimicking each verse like a small chorus of sparrows seeking approval, fruit treats doled out delicacies before an early afternoon nap vermillion is a casualty, tossed aside orange the pronounced star of this singular masterpiece, brushed across too much…
drawn out (ballad in b minor with blues guitar)
living hand to mouth though the hand not her own, the suckling mouth of thousands freed by her tenacity and wit called illiterate she moved through night like wind hiding fugitives in swamps covering her tracks with twigs pushing them all to liberty’s keep a woman who became myth lived with heartaches her own husband’s…
my freedom was a prayer request (this I know as fact)
this life a syncopated symphony illustrated in easy rhythms played throughout an average day the sound of rain a wind that blows that truest note sang out at precisely the right time it’s the feel of the pavement beneath my feet and the pleasant freshness of a lime a moving psalm a prayer request everyday a…
for phife. dawg.
there is no justice in this place little girl dreams get washed away with yesterday’s news and little boys are never taught that dreams can in fact come true we walk fine lines in this in between times where the end is not near but here an ending to the illusion that we are separate…
Advice to a Young Miss On the Occasion of her Coming of Age
Today, I was speaking with one of my students about a ‘first’ she will experience this week after a traumatic loss. She responded to me, “I’m just trying to be strong.” I started a conversation with her with, “What If I told you I don’t want you to be strong?” As I went for my…
showing up (a day late, a dollar short)
have you done this before? his question was innocent his eyes unyielding mask off this pain is all consuming. I mean are you familiar with what to do? have you done ‘this’ before? my head swims with 21 years worth of sorrows names no longer matching the right faces, circumstances now skewed. was it domestic…
vivacity
balls drop & bounce & bounce & bounce kitchen dishes broken dryers layers & layers of clothes shoe shopping pants fittings & the list goes & goes & goes walking singularly it falls to you vision keeper dream weaver no second but a village of helpers so you’ve no right to scream headed to the…
fearfree living 