mama audre: generate (light)

for audre lorde (to be whispered in hurricane season)

mama audre
how did you no
facing gale
force consent

to plant letters
like collard seeds
who new how
to ride wind
dispersing into
breath?

who did you
make
a line less birth
certificate
tracing from
Grenada
to St. Croix
to New Orleans
a bee-line
designed to clog machinge guns
an oracle
fashioned from scraps
of cloth and ink?

"i wish
you were living

(up the road)"

and
i
no
that
you
are
********************
Basic information on Audre Lorde

Loving Audre

Born in June

to June (Jordan)

either the accident of my birth
starts in the miracle of your name
or the intention my word
lives in the groove of the same

laugh
and
say
both

and else you brave vulnerability
leaves me soaking in salt
then each essay builds trapeezes
for my heart to sing

and again you
shake your head
both

thus from an honest body
choosing anything now
light define of alive

i say "yes"
and know

***************
Studying June

Phillis Wheatley: Something Like Seance

The Difficult Miracle (where June Jordan meets Phillis Wheatley)

"the girls" @ rendezvous

for "the girls" @ rendezvous bay hotel

the first time
i heard it
i thought
sucking your teeth
was practice for wrappers
training for candy
calling for sweet

but i quickly learned
the taste of my mother's hand
and
that learning too well
her disappointment
reflecting too eagerly
her pain
was punishable
by force

so i readied my mouth
for the audacity of this day
with silent preparations
on indented pens

but now
i think i may
have been righter
the first time

because
in the lips of some
in the mid-afternoon
that selfsame sound
in surreal slow motion
zips the air out of place
shreds rank into streamers
and tears open the veil
between this world
and the one
we'd rather have anyway

*************
The Scene

Emma and Aiden: "That Whole Drag Queen Thing..."

for Aiden and Emma

if i could make a hammock
out of round shrugs and hat brims
i would snuggle into hands-free salute
heads up to lay down
smooth burdens of afternoon

or if i could fit a bridge
of sanded growth
into the spiraling knarl of always
i would shift there now
so you could stand

but since you give me
a stomach light
with loosened ribbon
open with escaping breeze

since you give me
a life-line for unraveling
right from the base
of my hair trees

i will send electric curves
into space around
so air can hug you
if i am far away