“Considering the Flowers” (Charmi’s Hydrangeas)
Forgive me for burying my head in the sand for just a moment. I am a Black woman living in America with a Black “male” child and a Black “male” husband and a Black “male” father and Black “male” brothers and Black “male” nephews and Black “male” cousins and Black “male” friends, and every day that reality feels more and more like a maddening nightmare. I cannot at this moment look this pain “full in the face” or allow myself to feel the full weight of my grief for fear it will push me over the edge.
I’m weary. Tired of the same narrative. I need to contemplate the flowers for a little while to keep my sanity intact.
Power
The difference between poetry and rhetoric
is being ready to kill
yourself
instead of your children.
I am trapped on a desert of raw gunshot wounds
and a dead child dragging his shattered black
face off the edge of my sleep
blood from his punctured cheeks and shoulders
is the only liquid for miles
and my stomach
churns at the imagined taste while
my mouth splits into dry lips
without loyalty or reason
thirsting for the wetness of his blood
as it sinks into the whiteness
of the desert where I am lost
without imagery or magic
trying to make power out of hatred and destruction
trying to heal my dying son with kisses
only the sun will bleach his bones quicker.
A policeman who shot down a ten year old in Queens
stood over the boy with his cop shoes in childish blood
and a voice said “Die you little motherfucker” and
there are tapes to prove it. At his trial
this policeman said in his own defense
“I didn’t notice the size nor nothing else
only the color”. And
there are tapes to prove that, too.
Today that 37 year old white man
with 13 years of police forcing
was set free
by eleven white men who said they were satisfied
justice had been done
and one Black Woman who said
“They convinced me” meaning
they had dragged her 4’10” black Woman’s frame
over the hot coals
of four centuries of white male approval
until she let go
the first real power she ever had
and lined her own womb with cement
to make a graveyard for our children.
I have not been able to touch the destruction
within me.
But unless I learn to use
the difference between poetry and rhetoric
my power too will run corrupt as poisonous mold
or lie limp and useless as an unconnected wire
and one day I will take my teenaged plug
and connect it to the nearest socket
raping an 85 year old white woman
who is somebody’s mother
and as I beat her senseless and set a torch to her bed
a greek chorus will be singing in 3/4 time
“Poor thing. She never hurt a soul. What beasts they are.”
Pics and Posts 
scary times. peace to you and yours
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They are, Christine. It’s all so complex and I realize, I simply have to minimize my time with social media and traditional media. Thanks for stopping by…peace to you as well..
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My thoughts to you.. Shalom שלום,Peace, ،سلام Salaam
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Thank you, Carol for your thoughtfulness and for the blessing of peace.
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