Bay Window (Tamara Broussard-Lafayette, LA)

You close the door
And open a tiny window
So small that even
Shelly Long's skinny ass
Can't squeeze through

My emotions aren't stirred
Because of your kind gesture
But because of its emptiness
Your seeming cluelessness

You stand in front this tiny ass window
Like some Sapphic Vanna White
I smile but it's as empty as your gesture
What is that one window gonna do
My mind screams over pleasantries

God promised me a bay window
One where light flows
And my flowers can soak up
The early, mid and late day sun
No some glazed over bathroom window
Your try to convince me will be enough

You see I have never had onmy very own
I've shared a kitchen window once
Hovered in front of many
Dirty or Cracked portals of despire
That closed once my repairs were done

But never my own big ol' clean and shiny
Bay window
One that fills the room of my soul with light
and I hers

People with there own windows ask
What's the rush
Why so impatient
Why ask why
Is your window so big so bright
You can't see the waning light
Or maybe it's me

I've become one of those
Siberian women
With heavy coat, scratchy wooly sweater
With a scratchy disposition
And heavy heart

Light deprivation does that you know.

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 ...

Lunatic (Lily Lechler - New Orleans, LA)

“Lunacy” comes from the moon, Who cycles through brilliance and darkness Bipolarity’s patterns are not so easily assumed Opposites not so well harnessed Who cycles through brilliance and darkness? The girl who sits in bed, wrestling with Opposites. Not so well harnessed As she thought, her brain gives reason the slip The girl who sits in bed, wrestling with Her body, depressed, her thoughts manic. As she thought, her brain gave reason the slip And gives the gift of life in a dreamlike panic. Her body depressed her thoughts. Manic Lunacy comes from the moon And gives the gift of life in a dreamlike panic Bipolarity’s patterns are not so easily assumed

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