So You Want to Write Poetry, Woman?

Write poetry (if you must)
as though you shop for pain;
there was that George Stinney --
let's not forget the junior to his name --
the youngest person America executed
in the 20th century;
fourteen and black,
in a trial that lasted
less than three hours; twelve true white men
took ten minutes to find him guilty,
write about that,
how America strapped a metal hat
on to a shivering child's head --
write what you know or
humanise those we do not know, instead;
and tell their story; stories of those unable
to express what they have lived;
write that you don't have to be black
to charge America with the question
of how many white children it burned
at the stake of its predilection --

so if you're going to be a poet, woman,
write as though you shop for pain;
write through flesh and blood:
like loving,
like fucking,
we not only put syllables and words
on the line, but our body and breath
as well -- who has not held a dream tightly
like a babe wrapped in their arms;
hidden from harm from an injurious
world? And who has not loved
courageously enough to give up all
for a mere second of its charm?
Who has not loved? But who has the balls
to put their blood into their words?

You say you are a poet, so create an idiom
about how cleverly
differences dance in our atoms,
circling, pairing, parting and that
within such moments all history is made,
and written, and forgotten;
write your part, too,
where all things of science and religion,
words and silence, agreement and defiance
are the stuff of fusion --
embody forgotten histories;
express worlds of possibilities
that surround us at every moment,
and at every turn --
choose to be a life
that speaks with many voices:
those who have been, are and are yet to be;
chain-tied to an oak tree of history,
where many histories branch into one,
many paths taken and abandoned; where
seasons turn the leaves sour, and the wind
whistles a trail; alive and searching
for a touch with another to carry
us forward with electrifying urgency;

you say you are a poet --
don't say it, own it; take up the pen
and call out the inhuman
in those who have never
stolen a breath to give to another;
raised a hand to lift up another,
or felt the blood in vein enthrall
to beat its music to a mystical band;
put us in that chair
with a little black boy of fourteen
burning and choking
while America stood there
in a loving circle; a youngster
condemned by people who loved
and lost and lived -- not unlike you --
and then who mistakenly believed
we could simply dream into existence
some semblance of humanity; so

you want to be a poet, woman?
Don't worry. Anyone who has loved
and lost, and fought and cried
is writing something of value;
but they devalue, too --
if you're going to write
then write to the inhuman
that killed a boy for being black
and then went home to family
with a light back
to put an easy head on a pillow;
write to a world
where murderers are capable of love
and they look like you.

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