a saturday
betwixt the chin-high grass
hot enough to scald a lizard
beneath the mason dixon
a single home in a field of trailers
the big house
we dancing
the floorboards creak
the howl of a billion souls unfree
the record spins
the beat repeats
you still away,
steal away
heavenward
where your grands’ grands will belong to no one
’cept themselves
steal away to own your own body
what is it about learning you have a body that makes having a body so damn complicated?
joy is an impossible thing to remember
to forget
to know yourself as your own, but still a descendant of theft
joy to be free in vain
as a result of someone else’s captivity
two black women
egos the top rung of a ladder
trapped in the body of a ditch
but we wobble
atop a warehouse of stolen caskets
the dance floor shimmys back
sayin’ g’head girl, this joy is yours