trauma

Undoing

| Sheree

with each word

i write

i am undoing

you from

my heart

i am undoing

your lips

from mine

your hand

from mine

i am undoing

your power

over me

Other

| Sheree

she is a sad

replacement

for the woman

you lost

the woman

you allowed

to leave

because

you were

never

man enough

to hold

Shine

| Sheree

i had too much

shine

for you not

to want

to take

a piece

it’s a shame

you continue

to take it

once you

are gone

In the Earth of her Voice is the Remnants of Fire

| Sheree

If I allowed curiosity and love to seep through the wounds, I wouldn’t be here now at the page trying to make sense of it.

A black girl walks through the meadow, enters the dark woods and forfeits her life. And I can’t but think if she was white …

Trust. Always difficult for me to hold, like light on burnt leaves. Like the coming of winter any day now.

The race talk, an accumulation of cautionary tales told through time, she, with earth in her voice, filled the void of rage with what was right for her soul. Joy.

Black Wet Grief Has a Tendency to Cling

| Sheree
Loch Lomond

After Ada Limon

On the black wet branches of a sycamore, grief waits for me with the last few clinging burnt umber leaves.

Rain, black blankets, wind-whipped worm into the scarred wounds of me. Her great absence present.

Waiting for the shift, in fall, like stinging nettles’ persistence call, being still is vulnerable and exposed.

Yet suffering is all around when I choose to be part of the world. Privilege I acknowledge and push against.

All this will pass. Time playing through space. Illinear like this journey of grief on the black wet branches of a sycamore tree.

My Mother was the Moon, the Earth, the Song

| Sheree

As I pull into the roadside drenched in memory, I practice breathing. Cycle through the minutes trying to gain ground.

She was silence behind her smiles. Behind her ample flesh. I burnt down our bonds because she dropped before her time.

I’ve too much fire to ever accept her truth. Too much sense to feel the moon held her fullness.

Late into the night standing by the window, she waited for my return. Without fail. I took her love and joy without a backward glance.

I am dark. Too dark. But meaning comes with the light. My own light, learning to shine from the inside out.

I wish she had her chance. I take her picture sitting in the grass amongst the trees and seal it into memory.

The earth she could not give me. She didn’t know how as she laughed her soul into existence.

I am red. All of it. And not at all. But with eyes wide open, body claiming space daily, I listen to her song and bathe in the moonlight.