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| Ntozake Shange [Marilyn K. Yee] |
from NtozakeShange’s A Daughter’s Geography:
From
Okra to Greens / A Different Love Poem / We Need a Change
i
haveta turn my television down sometimes cuz
i
cant stand to have white people/ shout at me/
sometimes
i turn it off
cuz
i cant look at em in my bedroom either/
being
so white/
that’s
why i like/ greens/
they
cdnt even smell you/ wdnt know what you taste like
without
sneakin/ got no
idea
you shd be tingled wit hot sauce & showered wit vinegar
yr
pot liquor spread on hot rolls
i
gotta turn the tv off cuz the white people
keep
playing games/ & followin presidents on vacation at the war
there’s
too much of a odor problem on the tv too/ which
brings
me back to greens
i
remember my grandma at the market pickin turnips
collards
kale & mustards/ to mix-em up/ drop a 1/2 a strick a lean
in
there wit some ham hock & oh my whatta life/
i
lived in her kitchen/ wit greens i cd recollect
yes
the very root of myself
the
dirt & lil bugs i looked for in the fresh collards/
turnin
each leaf way so slow/ under the spicket/ watchin
lil
mounds of dirt fall down the drain
i
done a good job
grandma
tol me/ got them greens just ready for the pot
&
you know/ wdnt no white man on the tv/
talkin
loud n formal make no sense of the miracle
a
good pot a greens on a friday nite cd make to me
that’s
the only reason i turn em off the tv
cant
stand they gossipin abt the news/ sides they dont
never
like the criminals & enemies i like anyway
that’s
why i like GREENS/ i know how to cook em
&
i sure can dream gd/ sopping up the pot liquor
&
them peppers/
We
Need a God Who Bleeds Now
we
need a god who bleeds now
a
god whose wounds are not
some
small male vengeance
some
pitiful concession to humility
a
desert swept with dryin marrow in honor of the lord
we
need a god who bleeds
spreads
her lunar vulva & showers us in shades of scarlet
thick
& warm like the breath of her
our
mothers tearing to let us in
this
place breaks open
like
our mothers bleeding
the
planet is heaving mourning our ignorance
the
moon tugs the seas
to
hold her/ to hold her
embrace
swelling hills/ i am
not
wounded i am bleeding to life
we
need a god who bleeds now
whose
wounds are not the end of anything
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