Ode to a Black Bo(d)y.
Art by Ashkan Forouzani on Unsplash.
Ode to a Black Bo(d)y.
And here’s to you and your kinsmen.
Those who, having arrived the shores—half-naked;
Poured onto the sands. Spirits unbridled.
Skins glistening with the wetness of the ocean within them.
O, the sheer claustrophobia of it.
Goosebumps raiding the skin. Dark bodies sandwiched into tight spaces—
The clanking of mud-rusted shackles.
The stench of piss & shit & bodies rubbing against each other.
And here’s to you, offspring of the ocean and deep sea.
Child with skin a shade of the onyx night.
This world will not cease to bare her tusked fangs at you.
A predator, growling its way into your skin.
Her palms, sandpaper. You, deciduous wood.
Blackcurrant gleaming beneath this blazing disc of a sun.
Read the news; there’s always some tragedy,
tailing after your kindred. A black buddy. A black body.
Nailed to the doorpost of a house filled with agonies:
A cop, armed, lullabies a black man to sleep.
Makes altar of his neck—alters his breath.
and how else is worth measured, if not by how much
a thing is sought after, shot after?
Your kind, becoming like black spo[r]t on the world’s wrinkled face.
Pushed to the edge, between the high cliff & the rifle.
Still, you think it trifle — these tribulations.
Amidst the turbulence, you invent ways, dig tunnels
that bring you face-to-face with joy.
A Thalia mask glued to your face.
What better form of mockery than this—
Showing the furnace that Coal, in its elegant form, is
that the flame has kissed.
And here’s a rafter made from the timber of your undying dream.
The ocean, waiting, waving.
The waters, yours, the waters’, yours.
with the final line borrowed from Okogbule Wonodi’s Poem
Art by Markus Spiske on Unsplash.
Ode to Self in a Mother’s Voice.
Chrysanthemums, the weight of smiles,
are sprouting from the grief incisions
on the landscape of your lips. there are
colours arching into rainbow, atop the
things that once cameled the weight of
your sorrows—
child, you are dripping with miracles again.
You blink, and fireflies flicker in the
wetness of your eyes, in those parts
darkened by grim memories. in your
hands, a flowery bush unfurls from the
earth of your nail bed, shimmering
with the enticing glow of starry
things—
you are, child, attaining luminance again.
see, the fire is out— the wildfire that
rummaged through the quiet of your
mind. listen, sparrows are chirruping
again on the branches of your arteries.
a school of butterflies dancing on the
lotus field blooming on your tongue—
you are harboring life again, child.
you walk, and flowers shoot from the
sole of your feet. where are all the
spots your body once leaked of grace? see
how you now carry your scars with
pride; how your body no longer
blooms with sorrow. there are no
chasms on the landscape of your mind
to drown the length of your joy—
child, you are breaking into wonders again.
Art by Geordanna Cordero on Unsplash.
Betrayal
the boy begs to be the shadow
walking her to see her lover
under the moon’s silvery glow.
she declines the offer—
darkness crawling, lurking in her mouth.
still, he clings to her wrist
like the faux gold watch she got
on valentine’s day.
& so she agrees, asks him to go
fetch his sandals.
the boy dashes into the room—
reappears to meet her absence.
the bicycle’s chain sprawled on
the cold concrete,
like a headless serpent.
Art from McGill Library on Unsplash.
Flight.
There is not so much to tell me
apart these pigeons, who, in the wake
of dawn, come to battle with their
reflection on my window—a gorgeous
spectacle, I admit. Like them, I, too,
have this little ritual, where, at sunset,
unclad— I stand before the bathroom
mirror & notice how this body grows
in its opaqueness. The truth is, I, too,
was carved out for flight. To sprout
wings from my spine & make for the
beauty of the azure clouds. But just
how hurricanes take birds in flight
by surprise; melancholy often invades
the defense of this body; without
warning. Wrecking what little of flight
I have been trying to attain with this
heavy coat of flesh. I am made for far
more sophisticated things than grief,
of this, I am certain. But how long
does it take a fledgling to master the
secrets of the wind, to slice through air
with the blade of its wings? How long
will it take this body, too, to outwit
everything that desires to rip it open;
like a tree disrobed by the white rage
of lightning? See, what I most desire
is the weightless salvation of a bird,
measuring the clouds. To be able
to soar & glide & maneuver through
my agonies. But if I am to fall again,
all I ask for is the kind of grace that
ensconces a feather, plucked in the
scuffle of lovemaking— how the wind
takes it—the quill, in its palm, swings
it in a gentle dance; until it arrives
safely on the ground; with the softest,
the most graceful of landings.
