“I come to you America, scrubbed almost clean,

but infected with memory and the bellow of broiling spices

in a long-ago kitchen.”

- from “Practice Standing Unleashed and Clean” by Patricia Smith

 “We are called angry Black women because we use our arms for more than

waving to each other, recognize, our arms swing out, keep us balanced while we

pose for official portraits and Jet centerfolds”

-       from “The Bare Arms of Black Women” by Nikky Finney

On the occasion of the unveiling of Amy Sherald’s official portrait 

of the First Lady of Arms, Michelle Obama

“close your eyes—

make the white

gaze disappear”

-       from Black Imagination, curated by Natasha Marin

because white men can’t

police their imagination

black men are dying

-       from “Making Room” by Claudia Rankine

“Two photographs

of Emmett Till,

born my year,

on my birthday.

One, he’s smiling,

happy, and the other one

is after.”

-       from “Narrative: Ali” by Elizabeth Alexander

“Sit. Feast on your life.”

-       from “Love after Love” by Derek Walcott

God bless our neighborhood
barber, the patience it takes
to make a man
you’ve just met
beautiful.

-       from “Benediction” by Joshua Bennett

“Sometimes I don’t know who he is anymore

traveling the back roads between boy and man.”

-       from “Hoodie” by January Gill O’Neil

today, i am a mother, & my country is burning
           and i forget how to flee
from such a flamboyant backdraft
                       —i’m too in awe of how beautiful i look
            on fire

-       from “litany” by Mahogany L. Browne

Jazz June. We

Die soon.

-       from “The Pool Players. Seven at the Golden Shovel.” by Gwendolyn Brooks

We have so little of each other, now. So far
from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange. What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these
fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here,
have my seat,” “Go ahead — you first,” “I like your hat.” 

-       from “Small Kindnesses” by Danusha Lameris

“I begin to see

our lives are like this – we take

what we need of light.”                                 

 - from “Gathering” by Natasha Tretheway

“The baby wakes. He is almost four

            weeks old. I give him a piece

                        of my body.”

-       from “On the Road to Sri Bhuvaneshwari” by Robin Coste Lewis

“listen, 

when I found there was no safety

in my father’s house

I knew there was none anywhere.”

-       from “to my friend, Jerina” by Lucille Clifton

I am outside of 

history.                        

- from “Dualism” by Ishmael Reed

“Summer seemed to bloom against the will,

Of the sun, which news reports claimed flamed hotter

On this planet than when our dead fathers

Wiped sweat from their necks.” 

-       from “The Tradition” by Jericho Brown

Some people don't remember that 
love is 
listening and laughing and asking 
questions 
no matter what your age

-     from “Love Is” – Nikki Giovanni

“I’ve known rivers:

Ancient, dusky rivers.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.”

-       from “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” by Langston Hughes

“The blues calling my name.

She is singing a deep song.

She is singing a deep song.

I am human.”

-       from Gayl Jones, “Deep Song”

in the backseat my sons laugh & tussle,

far from Tamir’s age, adorned with his

complexion & cadence & already warned

-       from “When I Think of Tamir Rice While Driving” by Reginald Dwayne Betts

“for I must only use

the tips 

of my finger

with which I will

one day close

my mother’s eyes”

-       from “ode to buttoning and unbuttoning my shirt” by Ross Gay

“And it makes me think the biggest and blackest are almost always

more vulnerable”

-       from “I Can’t Breathe” by Pamela Sneed

Somewhere

in the light above the womb,

black trees

and white trees

populate a world.

-       from “My Grandfather Walks in the Woods” by Marilyn Nelson

sometimes i just forget to
exhale. my shoulders held tightly
near my neck, i am a ball of tense
living, a tumbleweed with steel-toed
boots. i can’t remember the last time
i felt light as dandelion

-       from “a brief meditation on breath” by Yesenia Montilla

 “Grief might be easy

if there weren’t still

such beauty – would be far

simpler if the silver

maple didn’t thrust

its leaves into flame,

trusting that spring

will find it again.”

-       from “Redemption Song” by Kevin Young

Have you ever tried silk sheets? 
I did, persuaded by postnatal dread 
and a Macy's clerk to bargain 
for more zip.

-       from “Used” by Rita Dove