All the Songs We Sing, page 7
Daughter of Eden
Gina M. Streaty
She glides
dark angel
White wings strike
reddened sky
Bronze arms
braided hair
words like garland
in wind
She breathes, “Ain’t I …”
Eyes fixed fire
Tight pupils now ashen fists
A cavernous mouth
pours, “Ain’t I …”
Curved body
An anointed rib
Adam’s seed
broken, dropped
A secular womb cries, “Ain’t I …”
Thunder mounts
Lightning sears new horizons
Women sing purple songs
now, forever
to themselves
Ain’t I a Woman?
Elementary Days
Gina M. Streaty
She reads
from narrow, gold-spine books
whose characters dangle
from open windows,
or hover above our heads,
disrupting ABCs
thumbtacked to walls
She scissor cuts
colored tissue paper
plops blobs of paste
from a plastic tub
on ragged pieces
of paper towels
for tiny fingers to daub
and taste
On the playground,
it’s her whistle shrills—
amidst the rumble
of passing trucks
and hind-end pinches
of lowbred eyes—
that summon us back
to the next
Our mother goose
She too is of fairy tales,
Snow White
to her eighteen dwarfs
This giver of stars
for good behavior,
and green apples
from her mother’s glen
We await her morning
callow caw, her blush
sky laced with cirrus clouds
to take the path
to the brown brick school
where memories are sculpted,
and we are too.
Your David, My Saul
Cedric Tillman
for Meka
I Samuel 18
I.
At sunset I watch the legions
train slowly through Zion,
loitering in our narrow streets
like brash perfume.
That armor is a bulwark of commotion
that covers over the cries of boys
straddling mothers’ hips,
their thick arms stretched out
toward your indifference.
II.
When you call me closer
I always pretend
I did not hear you the first time.
You beckon again
and though I am afraid
I wonder what would happen
if you could hear my music clearer.
But I cannot trust you.
Your hand hangs wearily from the bed
too close to the spear
So I watch you as I approach,
And even though your eyes are closed
I slide the spear away
so that I am between it
and you.
Tact
Cedric Tillman
Phil said
so what happened
and Sosh goes
Well, my BP
Blood Pressure
was up
it hasn’t been up
the whole time
and they told me to come on in
it’s
they call it preeclampsia
high blood pressure
it can be dangerous
so they said she needed to come now
they tried to turn her four times
’cause she was breech
That hurt like hell
basically
she was butt down
and you know
they just don’t come out that way
Phil laughed
yeah right
and I was thinking
how she sounded like a pro
how before
she might have said something snappy
like well,
maybe whores’ babies
come out that way
butt down
and I’m not a whore
you know, just as a joke
a little levity
amazing that she didn’t even think
to say that
A Few Years In
Cedric Tillman
For now,
I’ve brushed the leaves into a corner
to remember how the patio looks.
I open the screen door
to yell for approval.
On cold nights
the air smells scoured clean,
and even in the city
the sky darkens just enough
to see stars.
I point out the orange moon
and hold her like the male lead.
When I squeeze too tight
she never pushes back
like she needs room.
Sometimes I show love like
I don’t want her to wonder
if there’s anything more to know.
Every so often in the stillness,
More work comes down
around us.
Ashe
(So Be It)
Afefe Lana Tyehimba
“A thing or work of art that has ashe transcends ordinary questions about its makeup and confinements: it is divine force incarnate”—Robert Thompson, “Flash of the Spirit”
The Capture
She is called
Theit, The Ancient
A keeper of Southeast Secrets
A Sangoma of Swaziland
nesting the Underworld
three fifths scabbed and thick
She knows the sound
of moaning beneath layered mud,
the rush of volcanic ebony spewing
from warriors’ caked throats,
their songs and weapons limboed
like baobab trees kissing dust
Theit bridged their mouths,
offering a ransomed tilt
to grasslands once rooted sleek
in cowrie shells, now fractured
in bare-assed screams
echoing through Goree Island
The site where strangers
called on Jesus,
but tossed him sack-wise
through the Door of No Return
In closed captivity,
Theit begged javelins through eyes
that saw breasts branded
nipples pinched and twisted
wombs defiled
senses barricaded in rust
Wherein standing
souped in stocks
she pissed white lightening on their graves
and fainted—
a regal repose
hurtling deep through forests
where live branches licked her whole
With a baby’s urgent hunger
she suckled 15 million souls
from one nation
and twelve languages
and saw herself mirrored
in the watchful eyes
of men in flaming masks
women in serpentine jewels
She, dancing with spirits
of the dead who never left
the Holy Ghost
Resuscitated, she assumed
a forward stance
embalmed and stretched in stillness
a glittering diamante
of handwoven pain
Having danced the bingelela
having tasted tjwala beer
having pulsed between two worlds
as life … after life
afterlife … burst
like sweat from her pores
Her grown babies dripped puddles at sea,
teething the bit in their mouths,
she whispered their names goodbye
heart throbbing
like a severed limb
Stiffened a singular way
inside a ship’s cradle
their colors grow darker
more flavorful
a craved chocolate, melting
in recalcitrant mouths
running bittersweet
and three-fifths fluid
With brass underpinnings,
the Door of No Return
unhinged on Theit
and she flew
a storm to Atlantis
Middle Passage
She is called Billow
A Daughter of Oshun
A harbinger of Africa’s ethos,
with well-tooled rituals
and charms sharpened to slate,
Billow soared softness
into the choked links of chains
In full regalia, she is liquid
with silver lightning
For months she tongued Eastward,
an Otherworld griot stripped of words,
ululating tambourines on deck
howling chants from captains’ chambers
she loosed a savory madness
whipping hurricanes
to death
Her cushioned irons became
a white, headed anger
leaping at visions
of run-drenched boys and girls
with new teeth and little hair
cursing the texture of semen
drinking its influenzic potassium,
naked, save a grunting cover
lapping up stolen tongues
Billow left her senses
and lulled herself into asphyxiation
limbs ascending en masse
Yemonja bade her tidings
With hair tossed
into a snow-capped wave
Billow
conquered Gibraltar
reaching back to pull
the Ibo, Ashanti, Fon, Fulani, and Yoruba
from rippled depths—until
She grew heavy, spawning babies
grew wide with underground tunnels
grew tall with sidelong minions
grew aloft with branches high
roots low
spreading hide for drums
spreading Mother Africa
in billionths
sneezing wishes
eyes closed
soul ajar
she landed on New World shores.
The New World
She is called Barbara Gault
and she is the tool on days
when we are without form or substance
an empty gong
echoing around her shoulders
we watch her dream our faces
Some days, quick streaks of sun
and Miles of Coltrane
surge a purple healing
through her veins
and we are textured
on the tips of her fingers
our eyes pasted
to the faces of her spirits
some spinning, some soaring
some permanently still
She grooves like this for days
her being
clouded with tears
winded with screams
silent in prayer
Sometimes she is a speechless vessel
a staccato touch
molding shattered glass
into diamonds
The She in Her
that is Barbara Gault
is a griot for the hereafter
whose stories live in silence
capturing words
rhythm
blood
the pulse
embryos
breath
sheathed skin
forests
salt water
iron
earth
dust
the wind
creation
all gathered
ripened and sweet
in her
Sculpting what dilated pupils know:
that we are
the roar in thunder
the screech of midnight owls
the flight of condors
the hue of fire
the breath of life
the trail of incenses smoke—swirling
(Theit and Billow are sculptures by North Carolina Visual Artist Barbara Gault)
The Dowry
Afefe Lana Tyehimba
I.
Mud on balding tarmac
casts shadows against petunias
rooted red and sunken
like bloody cement
walling off the novelty of glass
lamp oil burning wicker
and memoirs in cedar chests
bridled like chaetal ponies
chomping the bit
II.
Pathways illuminate the homestead season
whose needs come and go
come and go, as breath
over greater distances
returning to ecclesial moans
for promised birthright
vanquished
III.
Grey twisted buns fallen
far from grace
knotted and streaked
craving the dust of lakeside herbs
a bitter tasteless choice
that conjures perfection
bridging cypress one year to next
and husking lies on matchlit porches
where hypertrophic dreams
implode
Legacy of Somebody’s Baby
(Beaten and Suspended from a Tree)
Afefe Lana Tyehimba
I ran red
while my blood flowed like
the River Niger
juice from the fruit
of the vine—sprouting
seeds and birthing babies
big as this here watermelon
We love each other’s sweetness
My red ran down my brow,
small rivulets down my back
in between my thighs,
through my crevices
dripped slowly to the ground
beneath
Which accepted the fertility and
grew roots underground
for hundreds of miles
in every direction
and I dance
First the spoons, turned to
drums, turned to tambourines
turned to Lady Day’s blues and
B.B.’s guitar and Coltrane’s horn
My fruit runs red and multiplies
While the World craves a taste
Tired Enough to Fill
a River of Sleep
Karen Wade
Sleep
river
tired
Snore
muddy
mate
Spoon
tree
roots
Hold
earth
joined
Yawn
tired
mist
Rest
river
runs
Blackbirds Listen
Karen Wade
Cars line
In front of the house
At the corner
A hearse turns
The driver’s eyes
Are windshield wipers
The hearse stops
Backs into the drive
Neighbors are
Magpies on a wire
Flying back and forth
Heads held high
Talking, listening, watching
Youngest girl whispers
“t’s wrapped in a blue blanket”
The hearse slips away
As it appeared
Driving Lesson
Jacqueline D. Washington
When i was
12 summers past
barefoot and tomboy-wild
in Daddy’s makeshift
stick-in-the-floor
Collard-green-Ford
i raced thru the cornfield
amid shouts and
Daddy’s waving arms.
March 18, 1998
New Spring
Jacqueline D. Washington
Fireworks of color
explode on pinwheels.
Manicured lawns
dot landscapes,
sport latest cut,
with perfectly edged sides.
Ribbons of tulips
thread grass-green hair.
Wind-stroked faces,
Sun-basted bodies
worship a tan.
Arms of sunlight
hug kites
dancing on the wind.
June 12, 1997
Morning Rises
Jacqueline D. Washington
Under the cover
of darkness
Dew clings to
cobwebbed-spun grass.
Tendrils of breeze shiver
on sweat-soaked skin.
Fogged glasses
blur the way.
Laboured breathing
breaks quiet.
A distant truck coughs,
sputters life.
Morning awakes.
December 5, 1998
Archeologist
Excavating the Long Green
Carole Boston Weatherford
The Long Green, a mile-long stretch
from the overseer’s red cottage to the Wye River,
Was the hub of plantation life at Wye House.
This was once home to Frederick Douglass,
Whose memoir of his time here is testament
To two distinct yet intertwined worlds,
that of slave and that of master.
Blacksmiths, carpenters, cobblers, cooks,
Coopers, farmhands, gardeners, grain-grinders,
Sailors, sawyers, schooners, sloops, and wheelwrights
Lived and worked on the Long Green;
A mile-long expanse uninterrupted by trees
Which were razed then to afford the master
And overseer a clear view of the quarter.
Always, eyes watching and the lash looming.
With shovels, trowels, and brushes,
I dust off layers of guilt and shame.
I uncover beads, blown glass, dishes, teacups,
Shards of crockery, pins, tools, cutlery,
And a two-headed doctor carving
Perhaps signifying an African healer.
I see stones and coins—charms
Lodged between masonry to ward off spirits.
Each artifact, a small part of a larger saga.
Imagine a farmhand—in the few hours
Of fading light he has to himself—
Carving this button from bone for his beloved.
Imagine her sewing the gift to her only dress.
