Namaste

~ for Christine

Jericho Brown reminds us that you’ve
Not written anything
Until you surprise yourself
In saying that which you hadn’t planned
To say.

Which is to say,
That to give space to the scream
I feel rising in me,
And perhaps in you as well
I stand naked in the shower
Or in front of a mirror if I
Manage some associates degree in narcissism that day
While also managing not to eat half a pizza the night
Before.
And love myself in a way that
Is as innocent and curious as
A child recognizing herself in a car window
Winding through the mountains on a clear day.

The parents bickering over directions,
Or the looks coworkers offered each other
At last nights’ cocktail party.

The scorned double dutch invitation of girls
Whose mothers took the time that morning
To set cornrows,
And plate breakfast.

The rough plaid flannel shoulder of the boy
Who doesn’t even say ‘sup?
When his friends are near
Or acknowledge with the corners of blue-bottled eyes
the deliciousness

Of your mouth
wet
In his
Behind a firedoor
just closed
an hour before.

What dreams of my mother
Will die with her body,
My body reborn,
wet and lonely, wreathed in steam, tear-stained,
Clean as my newborn
Going out into the gray limbed November
now?