Black As 1619

A poem

Photo by Stefanie Borbe from Pexels

I had the pleasure of premiering my latest podcast February 28th, which features me performing the poem “Black As 1619” and more. You can check it out below:

Hard as hot steel that peels…
The layers of reprobate dermis
As I learn to love you- My Blackness
Meaning swallowing all 1619 of you
As the shores gulped the floating seeds
Of those gone before

It means I’m loving you
All 1619 of you while I
Reside in Humid Virginia…

Humid Virginia drenched in Sweat and Tobacco
Sugar Canes and torture as babies wail
Before being dropped into
Leviathan’s maw

The caw of the Birds of Prey circling
Circling….
the

Strange Fruit and the blood I smell
Today is the same as Then
A tang on the tongue