Boys Are Stupid (Skyra Francesca Rideaux-Lafayette, LA)

You think you can just have me the way you need me

but you don’t see me,

you compartmentalize me

you strip me with your indifference

you make love to me with your

inability to say

you want me

your feet walk away from me every time

I wear jeans with no panties

my power is wrapped up in you

and I want that shit back

your neglect has stained my soul with

black flecks of insecurity

don’t show me off to the world

only to introduce me by my first name

I am more than that

my sex is more than your hesitance

to kiss me

you strip me with your indifference

you lie to me with every date that ends in a perfunctory hug

I want more

I want you

to want

to want me

I am enough

my lov-, like for you is enough

our bodies moving together in the same car

traveling down the same lonely highway

Is enough

for us

to start

but your constant state of stationary

is pissing off my attraction

wearing down my horny obsession

for your lips to stroke mine

if you cant respect my power

then stop telling me you need me everytime you say yes

everytime you come around

everytime your eyes flirt with mine

everytime you see me say I lov- , like you

and close your eyes and shut your ears you abuse my power

STOP

stop saying you lov-

like me too

because im starting to believe you

give me back

all of me

to give to someone who wants

all of me

all… of …me

because although how you feel about me

has nothing to do

with how I feel about you

I will still walk away with missing pieces

Comments

Come Hither (Annette Redmond Walters - Lafayette, LA)

I meant it not this way but the tears just flow and my makeup smearing all the more, leaving behind that familiar filthy residue. I may have begun to drive myself away, dragging you down as well. But it's done, I've flipped the switch and now it's dark once more. How painful is the music to my ears, I can't stand to be alone in it, yet here I am again. I pray you fly back and safely and warmly to me, though I fear I've dug the grave too deeply. As the dirt shifts within my soul, I choke on those loving words I'd meant for you. All the fragments of light I see becoming smaller and I wish to be near you in your embrace that might make me feel the warmth I'm missing. And in reality, I doubt I'd breathe another breath without you. So come hither and quickly soothe my dying heart, you are the only cure I know. I cry and cry again, come hither to heal and love me. Come hither and help me dry my tears.

Let That Fucker Burn (John Chenvert - Napoleonville, LA)

Let that fucker burn. Let the fire crackle like the whips once did— like bone meeting leather, like screams swallowed by the trees. Let the white columns crumble to ash. Not as tragedy— but as truth, unearthing itself from beneath generations of silence. Nottoway is not a mansion. It’s a mausoleum. A lie carved in stone to honor the hands that held the whip, not the backs that bore it. They called it the “White Castle.” A place of beauty. A place for weddings, for photo ops, for pretending that horror can be made elegant if the curtains match the guilt. But no paint can cover what happened there. Blood doesn’t wash out with white linens. And pain doesn’t forget just because you renamed it history. I’m not Black. And I won’t pretend to carry that weight. But I also won’t ignore it. My people—the Guanches—were taken too. Our language silenced. Our land stolen. Our names nearly erased. So yes, I know colonization. Yes, I know what it means to be disappeared. But I also know this— my skin ...

The Peculiar New Room (Nick Perere - Baton Rouge, LA)

A peculiar fourth room has appeared in my three bedroom abode. High ceilings Higher than any ceiling in the house Perfectly pristine whitewashed gallery walls The largest window one can imagine Stretching from floor to ceiling Wide as an ocean’s horizon Revealing the lushest greenery and the bluest skies. I am meant to show masterpieces here. But in one of the corners o f the perfectly pristine whitewashed gallery walls i s an ugly patch of dirt. Dirt darker than charred coal. And the dirt is crawling And multiplying. With their spindly legs and dangly antennae Vermin covered in filth and willingly ready to spread their germs Scuffing the perfectly pristine whitewashed gallery walls. But I have to move on, I have a gallery to exhibit. Smile and act as if nothing is wrong. Come. Enjoy the show. Enjoy the artwork hanging Upon the perfectly pristine whitewashed gallery walls.

Search This Blog