WHY WE ONLY HAD A FAMILY REUNION ONCE
Children don’t play outside no more leads to daughters don’t help in the kitchen no more and I drop rice on the carpet but kick it towards my cousin so it looks like she did it
I ask a woman I don’t know what her relation is to me and she says I’m standing by you which is more than I can say for most of my other relatives but I don’t tell her that I just laugh
My relation to this glass is that I’m holding it which is something I miss my mother doing holding me/on/us together don’t embarrass me in front of these people not even directed at me but
I know those words and that tone we all do don’t make me into a metaphor says the glass in my hand and I think it’s a privilege to ever think that you can control the actions of others
For some reason we are leaving now as daughters don’t help in the kitchen no more led to mothers ain’t role models no more and I’m sad because I never got to try the cake which was
the only thing store-bought so I had faith in it
At the Beach
this is the picture:
white white
girl girl
number number
one2 two3
me1,7,8,9,10,12
a
concerned
white
the
mom4
young
the white dad5
son6
a car11
1laid out with my sunglasses on soakin rays like timothy green up in this bitch
2laid out lookin at me like sun is touching her skin and she’s black
3laid out next to whitegirlnumberone lookin at me like why would she want to be blacker
4is shielding the eyes of her young son
5is staring, wondering how i am glowing
6is trying to get a glimpse of
7the original sungoddess
8tanning
9mother of dragons, i will not burn
10becoming the fire i promised you
11crashes as the driver cranes his neck to witness
12metamorphisizing into my true form
i make headlines—BLACK GIRL SHEDS SKIN, WHITE GIRLS SCRAMBLE TO TRY IT ON
Jae Nichelle, lover of sweet potatoes, self-proclaimed performer of Black girl magic, and runner-up for the 2016 Academy of American Poets Prize, is a young poet and spoken word artist at Tulane University in New Orleans. She was one of the winners of Youth Speak’s National Spoken Word Competition: Raise Up, a member of Slam New Orleans, is the captain and founder of Tulane’s Slam Poetry team: Rhyme Verses Rhythm, and also runs a poetry blog entitled http://www.pofoundetry.com.