My mother wanted to boil the salt out of the fish,
so much harsh salt, then chip that saltfish smaller
and smaller, so she could cope with the hawked spit
of her patients, their hatred gutting her raw
so that some days she wanted to tell them,
It’s only skin, we bleed the same underneath,
but she held it in. Some days she wanted to crawl
back into her mother’s belly, her little island home
and be safe. Some days she wished she had stayed
in that small place because if you study the damn dogs
in this place, they go bite you up, break you down.
Every day you feel like your teeth cracking on hard
stale cassava bread. This place ain’t winning at all;
is like they don’t realise we can still go back home.