Some great-grandmother told her daughter,
Never let no man hit you and sleep,
pepper the food, boil hot water and throw,
use knife and make clean cut down there,
use cutlass and chop, then go police.
Each daughter told over and over,
like brush your teeth, till it stick.
How my mother run-way man with cutlass,
chase him. How my gran use cutlass pon table
to explain to her man, Don’t lose your blasted mind
and raise that hand on me.
And so we are shaped, moulded and made hard.
I remember my aunt kicked her man out
after her child was born, cut him dead
like rotten wood, after he use her like boxing bag,
kicking her womb as she lay on the floor.
That day her blood boiled through swell eye
and buss skin. She knew he could not sleep; he knew
she wanted to kill him bad bad, chop him dead …
Raised in London soil and Guyana sun,
I never understood that need for cutlass,
where it came from, till I visited Grenada,
a place where man fist pound woman flesh
like kneading hard dough. I see bull strength
knock girls flat out when she man full of rum
and carnival. How Ronald buss lash in he woman ass
every Friday and Saturday night, kick she down,
buss she tail. And next day is black eye and bruise.
As Pauline clings onto Ronald’s foot, saying
she love him through each blow, I understand.
I never knew I had it. Thought I was soft,
till that night my friend could not drive
and I offered him my bed to sleep.
I felt something in his look, he and I
alone in that room, and my blood raised up.
My pores swelled, I went to the kitchen,
took down that knife, marched upstairs,
told him, I cutting it off if you lose your mind.
Don’t think it. And if you do, don’t sleep.