To Be Brown

for (fellow Feminist Wire collaborator) Darnell Moore

After Audre Lorde’s “Thaw”

 

we season language

into sweet potatoes

deep heavy whole

with so many rooted eyes

 

we reason lust

into underground

unbroken something else

always saying reach

 

all around us

worlds are cracking

shells are breaking

birth is calling out our name

 

down here we grow

syllable by syllable

digging affirmation

watering prayer to

ancestor mud

we know

who the ground will wake

into all our green belief

when the sky will recognize

our measured blues

how the people will dance

into heat shaped light

 

you and me brother

we remember why

 

and

what a bright thing it is

to be brown.