Category: Poem

“You know, you should win that every time.”
The images move when I touch them,
hunched over my phone
To escape.

I know what he says isn’t true.
The cards can be stacked against me.
And no matter what
I lose.

That’s okay. I don’t need to win.
Winning isn’t why I’m here.
I play to escape,
To numb.

To leave behind the judgments
And demands and criticisms
To mindlessly play
And yet …

In the back of my head, his words echo,
Activating my comfortable self-doubt.
Perhaps I should win.
Every time.

My shoulders tense as ego and id
Brandish their well-honed swords.
A familiar battle that, of course,
I lose.

Being wrong is intimate, familiar,
Like a worn blanket, smelly and stained
That I should leave behind.
And still,

I play.

waiting…

waiting…

waiting…

to be old enough to go to school
tall enough to ride the roller coaster
pretty enough to have a date

waiting…

waiting …

waiting…

to be mature enough to play adult
save enough to buy a house
stable enough to have a child

waiting …

waiting …

waiting …

for the child to grow
for college acceptances and mortgages payments
and weddings and reunions and funerals

waiting …

waiting …

waiting …

for awards and acceptances
acclaim and jealousy
for the career-ending gold watch

waiting …

waiting …

waiting …

for my hair to thin
my bones to grow brittle
my body to betray me, but still

waiting …

waiting …

waiting …

to have my voice heard
to be seen as I am
to be accepted as worth the trouble

waiting …

for permission to be –

waiting …

for permission to love –

waiting …

for permission to accept –

myself.

For those who come after, don’t follow in my footsteps.
My steps will lead you only to the path I followed.
A path of uncertain footsteps, hemmed in by the guardrails of convention.
A path filled with the boulders of societal expectations,
And the sharp, broken shards of glass walls it pushed through.
Pushed from behind with expectations of those, like you, who might come after.
A path filled with detours across thistled streams onto roads even less traveled.
A path drenched with the patter of fear and beauty, hope and regret, longing and belonging,
And joy.

For those who come after, please don’t follow in my footsteps.
My steps will lead you only to the path I followed.
Step off the path.
Pull back the brambles.
There. See?
Your path awaits.

I can recollect
the voice inside me saying,
Be. You’re the sunshine.

The voice urging I was more
than what others expected,
what fit into their lives,
what made them comfortable.

I was more.
More than just a mirror held up to others.
More than a stale bread to complement the perfect pasta of their lives.
More than a partner to correct their typos.
More than the quiet one who sat in a corner
listening rapt to their conversations,
unable to contribute,
unable to be.

that voice is gone, leaving no echo.
maybe this is all I am.
maybe this is all I was ever going to be.
a reflection with no substance.
nothing on its own.

February 18, 2021

Today, I am sixty.
An old woman
With knees that creak
And knobby fingers that
Scarcely want to bend.
Why do you fear me?

I have lived an ordinary life.
An unnoteworthy life.
A normal life of high school,
College, marriage, job, kids.
It left yours untouched.
So why do you fear me?

I had never been to the South,
Until I was grown because of
What your fear would drive you to
If you saw us, stopped us, saw what we were,
And were afraid.

You have always been there
Coddling your fear-made hate.
Often in blessed silence,
But not isolated, and never alone,
Waiting, for someone to nurture your fear
rather than help you move past it.

Sometimes, you confronted me.
You broke my windows,
Refused to report a crime against me,
Called me an abomination,
Screamed obscenities from your pickup
In my small town, as I walked home from work.
But still, I don’t understand,
Why do you fear me?

Today, I am sixty.
I’ve made more mistakes
Than I can count on both hands
And probably even my feet.
I am only human, just like you.
So why do you fear me?

The day I was born,
An inauguration took place,
Anointing leaders who called on us
To do more than we could,
To be better than we were.
And together, we did it.

Today, I am Sixty
And for the first time,
An inaugurant looks like me.
Making the inconceivable possible.
“You can become whatever you set your mind to,”
Took a step toward truth
For those without the privilege.
Making us better than we were.

Today I am Sixty,
And not afraid of being better.
Are you?

I am not Black,
But neither am I White
Or Male.

I am not Black
And have had the privilege
Of walking safely in daylight
Free from harassment
Free from name-calling
Free from threats.

I am not Black
But that privilege
Was taken away from me
By a dictator giving permission
To the hate-filled and misguided
To yell obscenities and threats at me
As I walked home from work.

I am not Black
But I could not confront them
As they drove by,
Thumping baseball bats in their hands
In the back of their pickups.
I could do nothing but drop my head,
And let their words burn into me.

I am not Black
But a knight of the dictator
Refused to acknowledge when I spoke
Answering his question about my business.
He dismissed our community as “cute,”
Where women played at men’s jobs
Rather than staying at home,
Unseen and unheard.

I am not Black
And so I cannot fully understand
The depth of the damage of these attitudes do
Day after day,
Year after year,
Generation after generation.

I am not Black
But I empathize
And I celebrate today
As we depose the dictator.
I am not Black
But I know the celebration is premature;
The real work is ahead of us.

I am not Black
So I ask those who are
To remind me in the days, weeks, years to come
Of the work that must be done
So that you and I can walk in safety,
Together.
No privilege needed.