I.

Colorwise, your earth-lovely hands

are nothing like

the dispassionate blue gaze

of bare evening sky weeping

revelations at your feet.

But the ambitious immensity of it

is very much

as your hands once were

loving one infant after another:

7 boys and 7 girls,

wrapping the blanket

of your blackwoman’s reality

around each of their minds

the way the air and heat and clouds

of this planet

circle oceans and continents

with their affections,

so have you cradled

our sorrows and glee.

II.

Some of us you saw blossom

then wither beneath

the merciless sun of oppression.

These are the facts minus sentiment:

3 of the boys, 2 of the girls,

your womb a victim

of america’s fondness

for dead black babies,

3 boys dead, 2 girls dead,

your mother and father, 4 brothers dead

and both younger sisters all

citizens now of the grave

and yet through your body

entire generations have crossed over

to defy the illusion we call death.

III.

Your children stare at you now

and find themselves confused

by their split perceptions

of a woman whose dwindling form

mocks her expanding spirit.

4 pills just to say good morning.

75 units of insulin

to help you manage a smile

and we keep looking in your eyes

as if staring down a road

searching for images from your past:

a much younger mother

5-feet-11,  jet-black hair

flaming like a river down your back

so much pride in your steps

that someone named you “Chief”

and proclaimed you ruler

over all things humane.

Your children find themselves confused

by their split perceptions of you.

But the one singing entered last

through the gates of your flesh

and the singer sees you

as you have always been:

an African womanchild

running naked through a village

with ghosts crackling in your hair;

a little wisegirl preacher

in the backwoods of Georgia,

chewing on lightning and spitting out prophecies;

a celestial Amazon, so far from home

so far so far so far from home,

your soul looks back

and wanders past Jesus.

The singer is looking at your hands

and the sky flowing beneath them.

Your years are begging to be held

and it is time to make time for you.

Bathing my arms in the waters of this prayer

it is time to make time for you.

© Aberjhani

(from I Made My Boy Out of Poetry)