There's a vigil being held inside my heart. 

Dim lighting and poured liquor. 

Your voice is like a sweet song.
Vernacular dipped in honey.
Strong hands...
that would grip my curves with the precision of a Nascar driver.
You are my fantasy
The left to my right
You are my ideal canvas and my brush stays wet.

RED

You have become woven into the fabric of me. 

A deep red stain on the white satin of my heart. 

I breathed you like air. 

I felt you like a gentle breeze across my face. 

 

Now you're like a hurricane 

You've uprooted my soul 

and now I don't know which way is up. 

I'm lost without the slightest inkling of how to find myself. 

I thought you were I and I were you, blended perfectly. 

A dream dancing on the precipice of a nightmare and we've glided too close to the edge. 

I've hit the ground. 

My Afro

My Afro's a crown.
Standing proudly on my head,
curling, coiling and twisting.
She's cocky.

When I think I have control she spits coconut and Jamaican castor oil.
I strap her down, grab one of her strands.

Twisting it around itself, until it forms a knot; she relents.
Then i grab another and another until shes completely bound.
She stays that way until i release her.

I run my fingers through her tresses.
she loosens.
Wild curls in every direction.

A middle ground.

16th Street

Life
Black life.

There's always been a difference.

Black life is fragile like a flickering flame.
Extinguished at the slightest infraction.
Four shimmering stars became a great American tragedy.

Shinning light on ugly truths,
making the nation see that terrorists weren't a far off notion, but right here on our soil.

Addie
Denise
Carole
and Cynthia are sewn into the fabric of America.
Putting a face to the plight of millions.

Angels

Where do unborn babies go?

Are they reincarnated?

Do they travel back to heaven battered and bloodied?

Ill equipped for judgment day

Or do they reside in their own realm

Twinkling in the sky, reminding mothers that have long forgotten

I weep for fallen angels

Lost siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles

Stories unwritten

Behind that frame

Taboo

Whenever I see him I think of you, your brother too

You begged your mom not to make you sleep in that room.

It struck me as strange

Lost innocence lived behind that frame.

He was a mastermind
Turned us against you in time

If I knew I would’ve told

Shit like that sticks with you till you get old
I wonder if you still feel that pain.

And I wonder if he’ll do it again

Cuz sometimes those cycles don’t end

But I know you would never keep it going.