Mr. Africa Poetry Lounge!
c/o Ambush c/o Mike
The rain-slick summer streets was
never really deserted and I drove
them. I would trip through
neon-lit city nights tryin
to make it fast through all my
young woman years till I could
be old and not be called on
to love no man, but just to
have what I have suffice and
all this wantin be covered by
a spreadin body, buried
in a old woman heart.
My
mind was takin me through so
many changes and they real-
ly wasn't my mens, was too old
to play at bein my sons.
They was brothers in the way
we want to think they all can
be when a woman need a
man, not just for beddin or
even holdin but to say
in some other way you is
woman to my man.
So I
was c/o Ambush or of
Mike; I would feel and they would
feel and sometimes speak and all
ways listen, jump into my
case, gimme back me in a
new relation to myself.
They dark devilish faces
would smile or go quiet and
always they eyes, well, they'd be
lovely, fierce but holdin a
young and aged peace. And I
love they young bodies and the clean-
ness of they soul and all at
beauty we guess at cause we
can't ever know the whole but
just sense it in they walk in
they stand in they flashin smiles
they quiet and lovely eyes.
Written by Sherley Anne Williams (1944-1999)
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