A construction crane,
Kisses skyscraper maiden
Red faced sun on edge.

The ugly poetess
Over the housetops,
Above the dry blades of the sugar cane husks
I have known fear, I have known hunger
I felt the pain of a nail wound deep in my foot
I belted out the blues like Nina Simone
An era of reform: the moments of truth,

On top of the hill, lies a village in Barbados
Acid rain, rooftop leaks on to my bed
It was a rough year:
only food sources were rice and breadfruits
We lived through it all:

It was my destiny:
To love and to hate them:
those old fruit loops

Through the eyes of a uprising poet
The curving of his pen,
Somehow, he made amends, he purge
the smoky air,
the disgusting sight of the pig pens
out of his mind

lack of personal dental hygiene,
the elders lost their teeth
Grinding down on sugarcane, while they
awaits the big meal of the day
Supper!

With innocent eyes and achy feet
I read so many books for inner peace

My stomach was empty,
but my mind was at ease
To dream big while aiming high

Marlene, Delores, and Linda
Known as the vanishing three
Migrated to North America
Where a Barefooted child
like me wasn’t supposed to be
Eventually, I know I would have followed

I have woven my feathers,
while looking upwards,
In my little corner under the old rusty galvanizes
.
At the old country shop the vanishing three mothers
told me that I wasn’t pretty enough to leave the island
Words of hatred, mere words of discomfort
I felt my wings tighten against my rib cage,
My tongue, glued against my jaws

From that day forward the poet smile against stupidity
And spitefulness, she too had come to
Eat her words, the old shopkeeper

The poetess enter another line from that era
Uncaring beauty without brains
Where are they now?

I walked with confident down that street
The misty air moist my skin
The poetess return to the Island of Barbados
Without the sugar in her blood..
.

It's a heart on world with my sleeve steadily exposed
A life line on a call line, dial 888 to be controlled
Puppets on a string to compose this household
The happier we'll be the more we're enclosed

       Smaller spaces to lengthen the gap
       Encircling our inner self control
       Consuming what's left of the demons
       Trying to get a refund on our soul
      
Love changes colors like a rhyme
Smooth and easy
Eyes like the darkness of time
Slow and steady

Yet we're still not ready for the fight
Insanity walks through the door
And just when the time is right
Our beliefs slowly melt into the floor

Your eyes smoulder with an imagination that is even bolder than I could have dreamed and colder than this toxic air we've been forced to breathe.

You write poetry across your face to form a Gas mask of rythym, blocking out the hate yet sealing in ideas that might frustrate you.

You hear the birds in the trees and you read the articles in every magazine, you take in information like the bees to the Queen.

Your thoughts radiate an aura surrounding your entire body, you bleed history and pop culture facts, you need the written word like an addict needs their cigarette packs.

You're empathetic to your core, you feel what everyone else does so you hide yourself in your mind until you can categorize the emotions from the lies.

I know you can feel the love in your heart even through all the cracks, like a weathered and torn apart roadmap but you're taped together perfectly and even with a few wrong turns you always find your way back to me.

and lie down beside me.

Lay your anxious head on my chest to
cancel out the echoes
of our ugly words and absurd thoughts, just

Breathe.

For now we’re distraught.

But remember,
our distress today says nothing of yesterday,
nor which way tomorrow will steer us. Whether it be high or low,
you need to know that I’m only here because
I want to be.

Because to be here with you, and you here with me,
is to create the most beautiful storm.

add my name to that inner circle thing
where newsletters about the most heartfelt go
the e-mails and spam about
worthy people nearly saints
singing praises in God's name hand
out bread loaves
and fish

keep my name off charities
that claim for twenty five cents a day
you can adopt: a child in Africa; an elephant;
send books to the Nile River flooded
refugees; the latest Syrian gassed.

I get my kicks, sunshine,
above the waist, (**** i stole
hell outta that line)
and I lied about that too,
some my best kicks, etc.....

well, giving seems to be a
rich someone ******* in America
in a mansion. Send me , count me in,
when charities help some
*******.

I've been down out, seen ten million others
the same desperate way, ain't seen or heard
one thank the United Way