White, Yellow, and Brown
Different shapes, sizes, and textures
Curly, straight, and wavy
You look at your reflection and do not see it

You're brown
You’re slim, light, and skinny
Your body does not resemble what it means to be a woman in your culture

A Latina woman has curves
A Latina woman's skin glistens underneath the sun
She contains an inner glow that resembles the strength she holds.

A Latina women speaks fluent English and Spanish
The purr that rolls off her tongue when she rolls her “R’s”
Her accent is what blows men away
Her accent is seen as exotic and from another world
But yours is different

You look at your reflection and do not see it
There is no purr because you can't roll the “R’s” off your tongue
Your slight accent is what worries you
Afraid your accent is going to get you a stare instead of a wink.
Afraid to speak you stay quiet and become discrete

You look at your reflection and see
brown sugar that’s sweet and fine
Your skin contains different specks of color which makes you different
The sun captures the qualities that you contain within.

You look at your reflection and see
A woman that speaks the language of romance
The language that distinguishes you from the crowd
The language that brings you strength and courage
The accent you once feared would bring you shame is the same one you have come to love.

You look at your reflection and see
A woman that has grown internally to love herself for the way she is
you contain the inner glow that resembles the strength and knowledge you have attained.

The eclipse has finally passed the sun and your  time to shine has arrived.

White, Yellow, and Brown
Different shapes, sizes, and textures
Curly, straight, and wavy
You look at your reflection and see
A Latina woman.

1

When lilacs last in the door-yard bloom’d,
And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in the night,
I mourn’d—and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.

O ever-returning spring! trinity sure to me you bring;
Lilac blooming perennial, and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.

2

O powerful, western, fallen star!
O shades of night! O moody, tearful night!
O great star disappear’d! O the black murk that hides the star!
O cruel hands that hold me powerless! O helpless soul of me!
O harsh surrounding cloud, that will not free my soul!

3

In the door-yard fronting an old farm-house, near the white-wash’d palings,
Stands the lilac bush, tall-growing, with heart-shaped leaves of rich green,
With many a pointed blossom, rising, delicate, with the perfume strong I love,
With every leaf a miracle……and from this bush in the door-yard,
With delicate-color’d blossoms, and heart-shaped leaves of rich green,
A sprig, with its flower, I break.

4

In the swamp, in secluded recesses,
A shy and hidden bird is warbling a song.

Solitary, the thrush,
The hermit, withdrawn to himself, avoiding the settlements,
Sings by himself a song.

Song of the bleeding throat!
Death’s outlet song of life—(for well, dear brother, I know
If thou wast not gifted to sing, thou would’st surely die.)

5

Over the breast of the spring, the land, amid cities,
Amid lanes, and through old woods, (where lately the violets peep’d from the ground, spotting the gray debris;)
Amid the grass in the fields each side of the lanes—passing the endless grass;
Passing the yellow-spear’d wheat, every grain from its shroud in the dark-brown fields uprising;
Passing the apple-tree blows of white and pink in the orchards;
Carrying a corpse to where it shall rest in the grave,
Night and day journeys a coffin.

6

Coffin that passes through lanes and streets,
Through day and night, with the great cloud darkening the land,
With the pomp of the inloop’d flags, with the cities draped in black,
With the show of the States themselves, as of crape-veil’d women, standing,
With processions long and winding, and the flambeaus of the night,
With the countless torches lit—with the silent sea of faces, and the unbared heads,
With the waiting depot, the arriving coffin, and the sombre faces,
With dirges through the night, with the thousand voices rising strong and solemn;
With all the mournful voices of the dirges, pour’d around the coffin,
The dim-lit churches and the shuddering organs—Where amid these you journey,
With the tolling, tolling bells’ perpetual clang;
Here! coffin that slowly passes,
I give you my sprig of lilac.

7

(Nor for you, for one, alone;
Blossoms and branches green to coffins all I bring:
For fresh as the morning—thus would I carol a song for you, O sane and sacred death.

All over bouquets of roses,
O death! I cover you over with roses and early lilies;
But mostly and now the lilac that blooms the first,
Copious, I break, I break the sprigs from the bushes;
With loaded arms I come, pouring for you,
For you, and the coffins all of you, O death.)

8

O western orb, sailing the heaven!
Now I know what you must have meant, as a month since we walk’d,
As we walk’d up and down in the dark blue so mystic,
As we walk’d in silence the transparent shadowy night,
As I saw you had something to tell, as you bent to me night after night,
As you droop’d from the sky low down, as if to my side, (while the other stars all look’d on;)
As we wander’d together the solemn night, (for something, I know not what, kept me from sleep;)
As the night advanced, and I saw on the rim of the west, ere you went, how full you were of woe;
As I stood on the rising ground in the breeze, in the cold transparent night,
As I watch’d where you pass’d and was lost in the netherward black of the night,
As my soul, in its trouble, dissatisfied, sank, as where you, sad orb,
Concluded, dropt in the night, and was gone.

9

Sing on, there in the swamp!
O singer bashful and tender! I hear your notes—I hear your call;
I hear—I come presently—I understand you;
But a moment I linger—for the lustrous star has detain’d me;
The star, my departing comrade, holds and detains me.

10

O how shall I warble myself for the dead one there I loved?
And how shall I deck my song for the large sweet soul that has gone?
And what shall my perfume be, for the grave of him I love?

Sea-winds, blown from east and west,
Blown from the eastern sea, and blown from the western sea, till there on the prairies meeting:
These, and with these, and the breath of my chant,
I perfume the grave of him I love.

11

O what shall I hang on the chamber walls?
And what shall the pictures be that I hang on the walls,
To adorn the burial-house of him I love?

Pictures of growing spring, and farms, and homes,
With the Fourth-month eve at sundown, and the gray smoke lucid and bright,
With floods of the yellow gold of the gorgeous, indolent, sinking sun, burning, expanding the air;
With the fresh sweet herbage under foot, and the pale green leaves of the trees prolific;
In the distance the flowing glaze, the breast of the river, with a wind-dapple here and there;
With ranging hills on the banks, with many a line against the sky, and shadows;
And the city at hand, with dwellings so dense, and stacks of chimneys,
And all the scenes of life, and the workshops, and the workmen homeward returning.

12

Lo! body and soul! this land!
Mighty Manhattan, with spires, and the sparkling and hurrying tides, and the ships;
The varied and ample land—the South and the North in the light—Ohio’s shores, and flashing Missouri,
And ever the far-spreading prairies, cover’d with grass and corn.

Lo! the most excellent sun, so calm and haughty;
The violet and purple morn, with just-felt breezes;
The gentle, soft-born, measureless light;
The miracle, spreading, bathing all—the fulfill’d noon;
The coming eve, delicious—the welcome night, and the stars,
Over my cities shining all, enveloping man and land.

13

Sing on! sing on, you gray-brown bird!
Sing from the swamps, the recesses—pour your chant from the bushes;
Limitless out of the dusk, out of the cedars and pines.

Sing on, dearest brother—warble your reedy song;
Loud human song, with voice of uttermost woe.

O liquid, and free, and tender!
O wild and loose to my soul! O wondrous singer!
You only I hear……yet the star holds me, (but will soon depart;)
Yet the lilac, with mastering odor, holds me.

14

Now while I sat in the day, and look’d forth,
In the close of the day, with its light, and the fields of spring, and the farmer preparing his crops,
In the large unconscious scenery of my land, with its lakes and forests,
In the heavenly aerial beauty, (after the perturb’d winds, and the storms;)
Under the arching heavens of the afternoon swift passing, and the voices of children and women,
The many-moving sea-tides,—and I saw the ships how they sail’d,
And the summer approaching with richness, and the fields all busy with labor,
And the infinite separate houses, how they all went on, each with its meals and minutia of daily usages;
And the streets, how their throbbings throbb’d, and the cities pent—lo! then and there,
Falling upon them all, and among them all, enveloping me with the rest,
Appear’d the cloud, appear’d the long black trail;
And I knew Death, its thought, and the sacred knowledge of death.

15

Then with the knowledge of death as walking one side of me,
And the thought of death close-walking the other side of me,
And I in the middle, as with companions, and as holding the hands of companions,
I fled forth to the hiding receiving night, that talks not,
Down to the shores of the water, the path by the swamp in the dimness,
To the solemn shadowy cedars, and ghostly pines so still.

And the singer so shy to the rest receiv’d me;
The gray-brown bird I know, receiv’d us comrades three;
And he sang what seem’d the carol of death, and a verse for him I love.

From deep secluded recesses,
From the fragrant cedars, and the ghostly pines so still,
Came the carol of the bird.

And the charm of the carol rapt me,
As I held, as if by their hands, my comrades in the night;
And the voice of my spirit tallied the song of the bird.

DEATH CAROL.

16

Come, lovely and soothing Death,
Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving,
In the day, in the night, to all, to each,
Sooner or later, delicate Death.

Prais’d be the fathomless universe,
For life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious;
And for love, sweet love—But praise! praise! praise!
For the sure-enwinding arms of cool-enfolding Death.

Dark Mother, always gliding near, with soft feet,
Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome?

Then I chant it for thee—I glorify thee above all;
I bring thee a song that when thou must indeed come, come unfalteringly.

Approach, strong Deliveress!
When it is so—when thou hast taken them, I joyously sing the dead,
Lost in the loving, floating ocean of thee,
Laved in the flood of thy bliss, O Death.

From me to thee glad serenades,
Dances for thee I propose, saluting thee—adornments and feastings for thee;
And the sights of the open landscape, and the high-spread sky, are fitting,
And life and the fields, and the huge and thoughtful night.

The night, in silence, under many a star;
The ocean shore, and the husky whispering wave, whose voice I know;
And the soul turning to thee, O vast and well-veil’d Death,
And the body gratefully nestling close to thee.

Over the tree-tops I float thee a song!
Over the rising and sinking waves—over the myriad fields, and the prairies wide;
Over the dense-pack’d cities all, and the teeming wharves and ways,
I float this carol with joy, with joy to thee, O Death!

17

To the tally of my soul,
Loud and strong kept up the gray-brown bird,
With pure, deliberate notes, spreading, filling the night.

Loud in the pines and cedars dim,
Clear in the freshness moist, and the swamp-perfume;
And I with my comrades there in the night.

While my sight that was bound in my eyes unclosed,
As to long panoramas of visions.

18

I saw askant the armies;
And I saw, as in noiseless dreams, hundreds of battle-flags;
Borne through the smoke of the battles, and pierc’d with missiles, I saw them,
And carried hither and yon through the smoke, and torn and ******;
And at last but a few shreds left on the staffs, (and all in silence,)
And the staffs all splinter’d and broken.

I saw battle-corpses, myriads of them,
And the white skeletons of young men—I saw them;
I saw the debris and debris of all the dead soldiers of the war;
But I saw they were not as was thought;
They themselves were fully at rest—they suffer’d not;
The living remain’d and suffer’d—the mother suffer’d,
And the wife and the child, and the musing comrade suffer’d,
And the armies that remain’d suffer’d.

19

Passing the visions, passing the night;
Passing, unloosing the hold of my comrades’ hands;
Passing the song of the hermit bird, and the tallying song of my soul,
(Victorious song, death’s outlet song, yet varying, ever-altering song,
As low and wailing, yet clear the notes, rising and falling, flooding the night,
Sadly sinking and fainting, as warning and warning, and yet again bursting with joy,
Covering the earth, and filling the spread of the heaven,
As that powerful psalm in the night I heard from recesses,)
Passing, I leave thee, lilac with heart-shaped leaves;
I leave thee there in the door-yard, blooming, returning with spring,
I cease from my song for thee;
From my gaze on thee in the west, fronting the west, communing with thee,
O comrade lustrous, with silver face in the night.

20

Yet each I keep, and all, retrievements out of the night;
The song, the wondrous chant of the gray-brown bird,
And the tallying chant, the echo arous’d in my soul,
With the lustrous and drooping star, with the countenance full of woe,
With the lilac tall, and its blossoms of mastering odor;
With the holders holding my hand, nearing the call of the bird,
Comrades mine, and I in the midst, and their memory ever I keep—for the dead I loved so well;
For the sweetest, wisest soul of all my days and lands…and this for his dear sake;
Lilac and star and bird, twined with the chant of my soul,
There in the fragrant pines, and the cedars dusk and dim.

Brown boys on the beach
All of them are great
So many just out of reach
Because most are straight.
Something close to mocha;
Unbelievably **** skin.
Some of it looks like heaven
And some of it purest sin.

Brown boys in shorts
Just covering bare *****;
Impervious to winks and
Any kind of gay passes.
But I hear rumors of them;
Legends may be a better word.
Gay things have been known
To happen with them I’ve heard.

Brown boys bare chested
Showing off their physiques.
Proud of that they take care of
Best I’ve seen in weeks.
It’s not that white boys here
Are that much less appealing
But there is something about
The way I have been feeling.

Brown boys can flirt here
In a way I have never seen.
It’s flattering without invitation;
Never insulting, never mean.
Someday I will get braver
And ask one of them to teach
How to tell which one is gay
Of those brown boys on the beach.

Occasionally I come across a person with brown eyes,
and I compliment them on those peepers.

More often than not, they laugh and say,
"Oh, they're just brown."
Or
"They're **** colored."
Or
"I wish I had blue/green/hazel eyes."

I want to grab them by the shoulders,
pull them close to me,
look into those eyes and say,
"Your eyes are alluring, deep, and warm."

Eyes the color of delicious coffee,
of which I want to gulp every last drop.
Eyes the color of ancient leather,
the binding of the best books.
Eyes the color of the soft soil,
from which everything good grows.

I say,
"Love your eyes, it's how the rest of us see into your soul."

Brown eyes are my favorite eyes.
Brown eyes make me feel like I am home.

after the painting by Mary Fedden

I kept seeing her around and about, but mostly on the beach. This is a small community and after five years or so I know who everyone is, except those who visit in the summer, though I am getting to know some of the regulars. I reckon she’s my age. When she looks at me in the store, and I look at her and smile, her smile tells me these things.

I have trouble with my hair. It’s thinned and doesn’t grow quite as it should. When I was pregnant and then nursing my children it was positively luxuriant. But later, and despite medical advice (and treatment I was unsure about and abandoned) it became an embarrassment, until he reassured me (just once) and I became an ‘adored woman’. He never ever spoke of it again and loved me so wholly and beautifully I had no reason for it to matter in his company, in his arms.

But seeing her, and often on the beach, more and more regularly, seeing her with her mane of strong dark brown hair flowing behind her in the wind, I felt a curious desire for such a wealth of hair. In fact, I began to feel something stir in me that was desire of a different kind. I can’t think I had ever looked at a woman in quite that way in any previous life. It was always men I sought, I wanted.

Her name is Sara, no h, just an A at the end. She said that when I eventually introduced myself. We were walking towards each other, barefoot both on that glistening skin of water the sea creates between the tides coming and going. It was about midday and I was, I was thinking and walking. I do this now. I don’t bring my sketchbook, I don’t look everywhere I can and more so, I have begun to retreat into my most private self. Perhaps it’s my age and so many years of feeling I had to be wholly attentive and active. Being in this remote place, almost permanently, has slowed me down, and I have begun to dream, to see beyond what I usually would have seen moment to moment. I’ve been re-reading the prose and poetry of Kathleen Raine, who understood this sea-swept place and was haunted by its ghosts, and who dreamed.

Never, never, again
This moment, never
These slow ripples
Across smooth water,
Never again these
Clouds white and grey
In sky crystalline
Blue as the tern’s cry
Shrill in the light air
Salt from the ocean,
Sweet from flowers

Oh yes,  ‘the sun that rose this morning from the sea will never return . . .’* I have become a watcher, no longer an observer. I put my camera away last winter and now hold moments in my memory. Here I can sketch. I can have all the time I need, and more. And I knew when I began to talk to Sara I wanted beyond anything else to sketch her, to know her line by line with the pen, and later bring the texture of her into paint.

Painting is where I am now. It’s direct, mesmeric, challenging, wholly absorbing. My needles and thread only deal with our clothes, my clever printing and collaging lies dormant in my studio, a studio I rarely enter now. I have a room upstairs in the loft that is all light and sky. There’s just an easel, a table, a chair, a small bookcase, a trolley-thing of paints and brushes. Even that’s too much. I always collected things around me. I brought so much in from outside and now I’m trying, trying to have as little as possible. This is where I will paint Sara. I’m already thinking this as we take the first tentative steps towards knowing one another. Names, where we live, (we both know). Partners, family, children? I have all this, but not here, only my companion, my love who caresses me with such care and attention. There are my cats and my hens. She has no one, or rather she talks of no one. She asks the questions and avoids giving answers. She just nods and doesn’t answer. Otherwise, she’s a straight yes / no person. She doesn’t feel she has to qualify anything.

We’re standing together. We’re intent on looking at each other. Words seem a little unnecessary because what we both want to do is look. ‘I can tell you paint’, she says, ‘It’s your finger nails’. My perfect nails and the pads of my fingers hold the evidence of a morning at my easel. ‘I have seen your work’, she says, ‘One could hardly not. You’re well known beyond these shores.’ I feel myself blushing slightly. I thought blushing had stopped with the menopause, not that it troubled me much, the menopause that is. Blushing though was a torturous part of my adolescence, but let’s not go into that.

‘Your husband,’ she says, ‘he’s up very early. I see him sometimes here, on the beach.’
‘Do you get up at five?’ I am surprised. My husband gets up before five.
‘Sleep is difficult sometimes. I walk a lot. I need to be out, and walk.’

Her face, her head is larger than mine. She is a larger woman altogether, bigger *****, long-legged, but with youthful ******* that seem taut and well-rounded under her brown frock, no, her brown dress. I only think frock because that’s what he says – ‘I love that frock.’ And he means usually whatever I am wearing now that’s old and rich in memories of his hands knowing me through a dress, sorry a frock, which remains for me (and possibly for him) the most sensuous of sensations, still. Au nature has its place, and I love the rub of his skin and body hair. But when we are lovers, and we are still lovers and usually when travelling, in hotel rooms or borrowed cottages, or visiting friends and dare I say it, staying with our various children. Last autumn in Venice, in this large, amazing marble-tiled room, with this huge bed, he undressed me in front of a window opening onto our own terrace, and I was beside myself with passion, desire, oh all those wonderful things. And for months afterwards I would return to that early evening, remembering the lights coming on all over the watered city as he kissed and stroked and brushed my body through my Gudrun Sjödén frock. I would replay, find again over and over, those exquisite moments of such joyful touching as he then undressed me, and with such care and tenderness I felt myself crying out. Well, he says I did. In one of his poems (for your eyes only, he had whispered) he admits to his own celebration of those moments again, again.

Sara’s dress is calf-length. There’s nothing else. As the breeze wraps itself around the loose-fitting brown cotton her naked figure is revealed inside itself. No ring, no jewellery, nothing to hold her hair now flowing behind her. She has positioned herself so it does; flow out behind her. This is so strange. Am I dreaming this? We have become silent and together look in silence at the sea. I can hear her short breathes. She turns to me with a smile and looks straight into my eyes – and says nothing – and then walks backward a few steps – still with her warm smile – turns and walks away.

I tell him I met Sara today and ask if he sees her on the beach in the early mornings. Yes, he has, in the distance, mostly. He has said good morning to her on a few occasions, but she has smiled and said nothing. Five o’clock is far too early to say anything, he says. She swims occasionally. I keep my distance, he says with a grin.

I tell him I would like to paint her. I should, he says, You should go and ask her, do it, get it done and out of your system. It’s time you stopped being afraid of the face, the portrait, the figurative. I’d give so much to have been able to paint you, he says ruefully, my darling, my dearest. And he strokes my arm, kisses my cheek, then, he slowly and carefully kneels down beside my chair, places his arm across the top of my thighs so when I bend to kiss him his bare forearm touches the edge of my *******. He puts his head in my lap, and I caress his ears, his quite white hair.

Sara’s door is open. She’s living in Ralph’s cottage, a summer-let habitable (just) in the nearly autumn time it is. I call, ‘Sara, it’s me’, thinking she’ll recognize my voice, not wishing to say my name. She appears at the door. ‘I have the kettle on, she says, ‘I had a feeling you might be by.’ Her accent is, like mine, un-regional, carefully articulated, a Welsh tinge perhaps. There’s an uplift and a slowness in some of the vowels. ‘You will come in’, she says, more a statement than a question. It’s rather dark inside. There’s a reading lamp on, but she has the chair, her chair, close by the window. There are letters being written. There are books. Not Ralph’s, but what she has brought with her. Normally, I would be hopelessly inquisitive, but I can’t stop myself looking at her, wondering even now, in these first few moments in this dark room, how I will position her to paint her form, her face, her nature. What will I paint? I look at her still-bare feet, her large hands.

And so, with mugs of tea, Indian tea I don’t drink, but here, as her guest I do, but without milk, we sit, I on the only other chair (from the kitchen) she on the floor. And she watches me look about, and look at her.

‘I’m rather done with talking, with polite conversation. That’s why I’m here to be done with all that for a while.’
‘I came to ask you to sit for me. To let me draw you, paint you even. You can be completely quiet. I won’t say a word. I’ve never, ever asked anyone to sit for me. I’m not that sort of painter. But when I saw you on the beach it was the first thing that came into my head.’
‘I should be flattered. Though I have sat for artists before, when I was a little younger,’ surprisingly she mentions two names I know, both women. ‘I know how to be still. But, those are days in a different life.’
‘I only want to paint you in the life you have now.’ And I realise then that what I want to paint was Sara’s ‘aloneness’. I think then I have never been truly alone since he came into my life and took any loneliness I had from me. Whenever we are apart, and still there are times, he writes to me the tenderest letters, the most touching poems, he quotes his Chinese favourites down the telephone. We always, always speak to each other before bed, even when we are on different continents and time-zones. He told me I was always his last thought before sleep. And I wonder if I would be his last thought . . .

‘Do you want to do this formally?, said Sara.
‘I don’t know. Yet. I’d like to draw you first, be with you for a little while, perhaps to walk. A little while at a time. Whatever might suit you.’
‘Would you pay me? I have little money. It would be useful.’
‘Of course’, I say this directly, having no idea about what one pays a model. He will know though. He knew Paula Rego and didn’t she have a female model? I think of those large full-length figures rendered in pastels. Her model’s name was Lila, who for more than 25 years, had sat for her, stood for her, crouched for her, hour after hour and day after day. I remember a newspaper piece that went something like this: since 1985 Lila has helped to give life, in paint, and pastel, and charcoal, to the characters in Paula Rego's head. Lila was all Paula Rego’s women.

‘Sara’, I said, ‘help me please. It’s taken more than a little courage to come to see you, to ask you. My husband says I should do this, finally get myself painting the person, the face, body, not as some exercise in a life class, but the real thing.’
‘Of course’, she says, ‘Let’s go and walk to the point.’

And we did. Not saying very much at all, but I suppose I did. She made me talk and gradually I laid my life out in front of her, and not the life she would have found in those glossy monographs and catalogue introductions, and God forbid, not in those media features and interviews that I suppose have made me a name I’d always dreamed of becoming, and now could do without.

‘I suppose you have a studio’, she said suddenly, ‘Is that where you’d want me to come?’
‘Yes, I have a studio. No, I don’t think I want you to come there. Not at first anyway.’ I was floundering. ‘ I’d like to draw you, paint you possibly on the beach, where we met, so there would be sea and sky and breeze blowing your hair.’
‘And a steamer out on the horizon belching smoke from its funnel and the sea blowing white horses and dancing about. I’d be right by the seastrand with waves and spray and foam, and under a greyish sky. Not a sunny day. A breezy day. In my brown dress, sitting on the sand by the tide marks, looking out to sea, looking at the steamer away in the distance, sitting with my left hand behind me holding myself up, and the shape of my legs akimbo bent slightly under my brown dress. How would that be?’
‘Perfect’, I said.

And it was.

I never even knew I was different. And by different I mean not white.
My mom has green eyes and light skin with freckles. She has brown hair that beautifully sprouts white strands sometimes, but she's never not beautiful. Or never not has green eyes, or light skin with freckles.

I have brown skin. No freckles, and eyes that look like almonds that didn't make it into the bag, in shape and color. My skin is dry. Except my face. My skin is more than one shade of brown, especially on my face. My skin is stretched. Never been tight. My skin reminds me of a potato, not so much "cafe con leche" like my nana says.

I grew up in this white town, with white people, and white expectations. I was never allowed not to act like a child because children of color are barely seen as children. I was never allowed to run or yell like the white kids on the playground because that made me look like I hadn't been "raised right".

I could never sit on the lunch benches outside like the other kids because the yard-ladies would only see my brown skin in the sea of whiteness and only tell me to not sit there.

I could never struggle in academics because that meant my hispanic mother didn't invest in my "academic success" and CPS would show up and ask me questions about whether my mom loved me or not. My mom worked three jobs, and saw us for less than three hours a day. she worked so she could invest in our success.

I couldn't say I was hungry because that meant my family was too poor and couldn't feed me. And then have CPS show up and ask to see the fridge. [I wasn't actually hungry, it's just that  by the time I was 7 I had developed an eating disorder because I had no idea how to cope with anxiety].

I could never not listen to authority because it wasn't teenage rebellion, it would qualify me for special behavior programs targeted towards "troubled youth" and we all know that's code for "kids of color who won't make it past  without being put in jail, being *****, pregnant at least once, or dying-- and by dying I mean killed by the system... choose any system because they're all designed to **** POC anyway".

I could never play in the sun during the summer with my white latinx cousins because the sun is not a brown girl's friend. The sun made my skin dark and made my aunt's hiss about my color to my mom and how she shouldn't let us out without sunscreen because we'd turn into "negritas", and that's what we shouldn't want.

I could never love myself because that doesn't exist when you aren't white. I mean, how do you love a body with thick brown hair, cracked skin, and a nose that doesn't look like Cinderella's?  I mean, how can you love a body that doesn't look like anyone in the new J-14 magazine? I mean how do you love a body that's never seen the sun because she's scared of being too dark because then shes's ugly? I mean, how does a brown girl even love herself?

I was three
When I first felt the pull
And I know it seems impossible
But I know my heart
And it gave this tug
Telling me this was the beginning
Of my search

I was seven
When it pulled again
Telling me I hadn't
Looked long enough

I was nine
When I figured out
That friendship
Led to crushes and the tug
Told me it could lead
To more
So I couldn't give up
Not yet
I continued my search

At ten
The tug snapped
My mind out of a crush
And back into reality

Then at 11
The feeling that tug
In my chest
Faded and instead
I felt flipping there
Brown eyes pierced my soul
And my chest flipped wildly

At 12
My brown eyed boy left
And the tugging started again
Reminding me of him
Everyday
And how his eyes
Made my heart flip

At 15
I was reunited
With my brown eyed boy

Finally at 16
We've settled
And every time
I look at that boy
Who is now a man
His eyes still seeing
Every bit of the real me
I smile
Knowing my search is finally
Over.

Those lips on mine
I remember all so well
Yes, I got to tell
We embraced in a kiss under the Moon
The Moon seemed to smile
But it was that fascinated kiss while
Love came out through Sarah Brown’s kiss
Now that is something no one can miss
No woman I ever dated could compare in Sarah Brown’s kiss
Sarah Brown’s kisses were on impulse
Her kisses elevated my pulse
That kiss was like, “Look what you have done to me”
But Sarah Brown was a sweet thing
That kiss will always be my sling
Sarah Brown’s kiss have transported both of us to the Moon and into the Milky Way
But I am ok
Sarah Brown, your kiss will always be my relay
You heard, “The kiss to my lips”
Sarah Brown, I know it has been awhile
There was something about you because you had style
I wonder even now in where you are at
Your kiss was a devoted kiss
That is the impact your kiss had on me
Our lives seemed to have turned a different twist
Yet kiss me now into everlasting.

Black dress,  white dress
Twin souls, twin sisters,
hold hands in the october sun..

both different, both the same..
on this day, a frog is caught..
they take it home..

they feed it, they take care of it
butterflies white, butterflies black..
sisters smile to eachother..

brown eyes, blues eyes,
sisters, twins
souls trapped under the october sun..

holding hands
blue and brown eyed twins..
are followed that day under the october sun..

One of them could have run..
but blue could not leave brown..
and thus they are together forever..

At times I sit
Back and relax
from the daily disappointment
of another failed attempt
to make a milli
out of 2 greenbacks
and a shiny penny
so money i lack
due to employers
not callin a brotha back
"dont worry Wayne"
"i dont care about that"
"im really feelin you"
"i got yo back"

her name was Elaine
beautiful black woman
skinned the finest brown
kept my head off the ground
facing up to the sky
with all the confidence
of a grown *** man
till the week my luck
ran out like
our well ran dry
i was victim of nonsence
moms got word that
i smashed in the backseat
snatched back the keys
havent seen ol' girl since

lookin up to ask
what more can happen
i recieve a call
that put me on my ***
my one thang from
around the way
was seen at the mall
hugged up wit women
i put the phone down
cause im mad as hell
turned to the liquor
tilted the bottle
maybe i can find
that hidden message
pour up the brown
so i can sip
till i cant tell
this *******
aint just in my mind

Courvoisier or Hennessy
Remy Martin too
when i find my
next one thang
the brown got my back
when im in the groove
kissing the lips
of that beautiful child
born of kings and queens
of kingdoms not crack
workin a 9 to 5
not depending on
the next coke move
relieving her stress
while breaking that back
blast off at 9
cause her love
might taste so divine
scratch me up
then we goin till 5
i know i wont
be that 60 second man
and let her down
cause the brown got my back
i figured out my problem
just gotta lay that
brown **** down

Sweet-lipped Psyche's pale white skin
All the men in Greece dragged in.
And the poor girl's dark brown eyes
Led Aphrodite her to despise.
For Psyche truly was a beauty,
Reputed as brighter than Aphrodite.
If Aphrodite was a dark red rose,
Of which we've written poetry and prose,
Psyche was a pure-white Aganisia
For which they wrote a deep-sea saga.
But she knew it was sore unwise
To find herself level with a Goddess' eyes.
The only proof needed for Psyche
Was the sad fate of the maiden Arachne,
Who challenged Athena to a weaving contest,
And though her tapestry was judged the best,
It was she that ended as the melancholy loser,
For Athena punished her with the life of a spider.
And so it was that Psyche knew
Aphrodite wold claim her life too.
So Aphrodite sent her son,
The lovely, winged, holy one,
Whose golden arrows fly at night
And relieve bored lovers of their plights.
She sent Eros to shoot his arrow
And pierce it through to Psyche's marrow,
Then set before her a crocodile,
The scaly terror of the Nile,
With which she'd fall in love straightway,
And then she'd come to rue the day.
For crocodiles have no love to give,
So it would eat her, and she'd cease to live.
On the sleeping Psyche Eros descended,
Long before the night had ended,
In whose dainty breast to shove
A golden arrow poisoned with love.
He prepared to bury it to the hilt,
But a drop of love on him was spilt,
At the moment he saw her eyes, dark brown,
Look to him and stare him down.
Then Eros went back to his mother
And told her he could not wed another
Who did not shine quite so brightly
As his sweet-lipped brown-eyed Psyche.
So spiteful Aphrodite cursed
Psyche through her red lips pursed,
That the girl would find no husband
Among God, animal, or man.
And Eros this so greatly angered
He could no more with arrows linger
At the foot of lovers' beds
To foster love in their young heads.
The entire world then ceased to love
Whether it walked on foot or hoof.
Whether it swam or flew on wing
It could not love nor gain others' loving.
When love no longer circulated,
Aphrodite it aggravated
To see her temple lying bare
And to feel the gray growing in her hair.
She told Eros he'd have what he desired
If only he would kindle love's fires.
So at the mountain, Psyche's family offered her
And she was borne away on the back of Zephyr
To Eros' golden gay abode
That he and his ghostly servants called home.
In the golden rooms she wandered by daylight,
But she lay with Eros in the dark when came night.
She knew not who her darling was,
But called her ignorance a test of trust.
Never to look upon him by day,
She continued in this way,
Until she longed to visit her family,
Which her husband granted her gladly.
But he held her, and he warned her
Not to let her sisters persuade her.
"They may try to tear you away
By telling you gruesome stories." he'd say.
Then, trippingly, from Olympus she jumped down
To walk the streets of her hometown.
She told her sisters her whole story
And they turned it into something gory.
"He could be a serpent," they'd say,
"Fattening you up for the day
When he can pop you in his mouth and eat you"
Unfortunately, she took their words as true.
"So, when he comes to you at night,
Just gaze on him by candlelight!
If he's a serpent, use this knife,
And you'll no longer be his wife.
But make sure not to spill the oil,
Or his waking will cause great turmoil!
We'll find out about that young buck!
Use the candle, the knife, don't spill, and good luck!"
She walked back to the palace at their behest,
Butterflies banging within her chest.
Could the faceless man with whom she'd spent her nights
Be revealed as a serpent by candlelight?
She did not have to wait for long
To prove her treacherous sisters wrong.
As she lay in the great soft bed,
The instructions tangled inside her head,
And lighting the candle, she almost fumbled,
But when she saw his face, she truly stumbled!
Eros' beauty knocked her senseless,
Leaving mortal Psyche defenseless,
And causing her to spill the oil, which smoldered
On Eros' godly golden shoulder.
He, awaking with a start
Was disappointed to his heart
That Psyche cold be so unfaithful
And make a decision so egregiously fatal.
Then, jumping from the casing, he flew
Out of Psyche's lustful view.
And she, for her part, suddenly found
That from the palace she'd been cast down
To a field of which she had no memory,
Or very dim, if she had any.
In despair, she began to flounder,
Then resigned herself to wander
Until she came to a temple edifice,
Which was, on Earth, Aphrodite's face,
And begged the unseen Goddess hear her out,
Trying her patience with childish whining shouts.
Aphrodite, trying only to divert,
Cast a basket of grains down to the dirt,
And told the weeping lovely malcontent
That if she sorted the grains 'fore day was spent,
She just may see her sweetheart once again.
All she had to do was sort the grain.
But Psyche, though her fingers were dainty and thin,
To separate the grains could not begin,
And sobbing, lay upon the stony floor
That was as cold as the Goddess had acted before.
The ants, which had been drawn to the golden grain,
Bore her load and relieved her of her pain.
In their famously sure and straight black line,
They each picked up a piece of grain so fine
That it might with ease pass through a needle,
And into order they the sweet grain wheedled.
Then at the very setting of the sun,
Aphrodite found the task was done,
And though she praised the poor girl outwardly,
Inside she felt the bloom of hate for Psyche.
So she set her down on one side of a stream,
Where on the other was a field of green,
In which lived Helios' golden sheep
From which she was to obtain some shining fleece.
Then Aphrodite left her there to play,
And flew to Mount Olympus far away.
But Flumen, God of Rivers, raised his head
To warn sweet Psyche from his riverbed
That the sheep were so fierce, if she but pulled one hair,
They'd all turn on her and eat her then and there.
It was better if she waited 'til midday
When the sheep lay down to sleep the heat away.
Then she could cross where the river rushes,
And pick the wool that had got caught in the bushes.
So Psyche followed Flumen's good advice,
And for Aphrodite's cruelty she paid no price.
Aphrodite's blood boiled when she saw
That Psyche had survived it after all.
Again, she tried to send her to her death
And charged her to collect water from a cleft
Which mortal humans could not enter,
And in which serpents would surely spend her.
But now it was an eagle came to her aid,
Who stormed inside and flew between the snakes,
Then picked a pouch of water in its beak,
And back out of the cleft to Psyche it sneaked.
Aphrodite, at her dastardly wit's end,
Devised a horrible place for her to Psyche send.
"Psyche, caring for my ailing son
Has drained each drop of beauty, every one,
From my former glory of a face.
Therefore, I command you to that place
Where Persephone dwells. Then you must beg
For some of her beauty, just a tiny dreg.
Then you may have my son, I give my promise,
As holding him from you has marred my face."
Then Psyche, with tears streaming from her eyes,
Decided the only way there was to die.
In what she had appointed her fatal hour,
She climbed up to the top of a high tower,
But her melancholy was so disturbingly great,
All the Universe moved to it abate,
So that the very tower she climbed upon,
Awoke and spoke to her as if a person.
"Psyche, there is a way to the Underworld alive,
So that you need not from my roofing dive."
And to the Underworld the tower gave her
A route and some directions just to save her,
Then it sternly warned her that not of meat,
Nor of anything but bread in Hades could she eat.
So she followed the Tower's path back down
And disappeared into the heaving ground.
And when she found herself before Persephone's throne
She asked to take a parcel of her beauty home,
Which the emotionless Queen of the Screaming ******
Without word placed in Psyche's quivering hand.
The hardest part of the impossible task being done,
Psyche headed back up toward the sun,
And, reasoning that she was to see her beloved before nightfall,
Decided to use some beauty from the parcel.
Inside she found not beauty, but a stifling sleep,
Which forever in its clutches would she keep
If Eros had not chancely happened by,
And wiped Persephone's sleep from Psyche's eye.
Then, carrying her on his back, he barged
Into the Hall of the Olympian Gods.
He bade them let him wed himself and Psyche
And disregard the protests of Aphrodite.
Then Jupiter, indeed, allowed it obligingly,
For he was a man who greatly enjoyed a party.
Ambrosia she was given so to seal
Her immortality and place her among the surreal.
Then after many years of love and laughter,
Psyche bore Hedone, their lovely daughter.
This is how the beauty of the Human Soul,
Triumphed over the beauty of lust and gold.
All this Eros and Psyche had to take.
All this they endured for their love's sake.
They demonstrate the purity of love,
That is admired by Gods above.
In the end, it is the pure Mariposa
Who is more deserving of ambrosia.

5:30 a.m:

Been awake for an hour, can't sleep, can't relax the brain. Came up with this. Just something to do at this tme of the morning.

I don't know how many times, never counted them, when investigating a motor vehicle accident, a participating driver said to me: "I wouldn't have hit that parked car if that "little brown dog" hadn't run out in front of me!", or "I had to swerve to keep from hitting that "little brown dog!" If in a tree-lined neighborhood, substitute a squirrel. Squirrels add more crediblity, simply because their reputation for running out in front of moving vehicles at the 'last second" is universal.

Why do squirrels do that? I don't know. I don't know anyone that knows. I don't know anyone who knows anyone that knows! It is truly, one of "natures mysteries." And, it's hard to prove that it didn't happen, for these little beasts always seem to disappear,  never to be seen again.

Why a "little brown dog?" Dogs come in different colors, different sizes, but in vehicle accidents, it's always the small, "little brown dog".. It makes no difference that the blood alcohol level in the driver may be two to three times over the limit, or talking on their cell phone, it's always the fault of the creature with the furry little ****.

This will probably generate some comments on collisions with deer, moose, perhaps a rhinocerous, but that's a different level. I interviewed one driver who claimed the bright lights from a UFO blinded him moments before he "ran into the ditch", then sped off into "nether space." That UFO was probably piloted by a "little brown dog" and a squirrel.

01-24-2016

Brown.
Mahogany brown.
Mahogany brown, with pieces of melted chocolate.
Mahogany brown with pieces of melted chocolate, never failing to melt my heart.

I gaze into your eyes, noticing how the clouded sunlight has lightened the color and made it easier to see
mahogany brown, with pieces of melted chocolate.

They are warm and smiling, because you are warm, and smiling up at me as I gaze into your eyes. Your smile leads me to notice your lips, which I love to kiss.

I love to kiss those lips, and I always feel my heart jump when I do. It skips a beat as I sink into your warmth, and I kiss you again because
I love to kiss those lips.

Soft strands, darkness streaked with light.
Soft strands, darkness streaked with light, always feel so soft against my fingertips.
I brush your hair away from your face with butterfly fingers, gentle.
You catch my fingers in your hand, weave your fingers through mine.
I never want to let go,
   never
             never
I never want to let go of you, and I press my lips against yours again. You hold me close, so close, and our souls touch.
I feel our souls touching, stretching feathery fingertips to clasp hands and hang on for dear life.
I gasp at the sensation, at the feeling of being
whole.
And I look into your eyes, full of love and warmth and passion and desire;
mahogany brown, with pieces of chocolate.

I'm brown skinned with black marks to add
The black marks add the extra hue to my skin
But I'm being crucified because of it
I'm being disregarded because of it
I'm being ignored because of it
I'm being hated because of it
I'm being disrespected because of it
I'm being discouraged because of it
It was supposed to be a bound art of recites upon skin
A simple brown black piece to be admired
A symbol to walk with pride and adoration
I'm brown skinned with black marks to add
The black marks add the extra hue to my skin
Searched for certain little sin on the black marks added to my skin
have I wronged anyone?
By not choice but by if nature has chosen
To paint a sacred black spots on a brown skin
Black spotted brown skin if not clear brown skin
As happy as I will be
As proud as I will be
Words of the world's eye may not bruise part of my heart
I'm brown skinned with black marks to add
The black marks add the extra hue to my skin
As grateful I shall become

By :kaledynthinks

I lay in your arms my brown eyed man'
your gaze moulding mine like clay
seamless my breathe moves like sand
melting, in your arms I stay....

Helpless by your side I shall sway
breathless i look through velvet skies
selfless you stay by my side
Brown eyes, I know you tell no lies....

Lifeless now your brown eyes gaze above the stars
forever we are in heaven's arms that nest
cold and wet like the moon's scars
endless now your brown eyes are above the rest.....

My brown eyed man..

Debbie

The photos were leaked today
They were of a **** woman with brown skin
Love making as she stared straight into the lenses
I was showed by a man who did not know how to react once I had been shown
My reaction was not shock
I merely stated "That's baad"
I did not know how to react to the staunch cyber-bully who was sure he was doing himself a justice by being so open about his anger at the naked, brown, humiliated, naked, shamed, beautiful
I am shamed by his shaming
I am naked by his *******
I am beautiful by myself sometimes
Sometimes I take the tape off my camera and position it near my bloom
I am not alone in this activity and yet I feel alone in an intimate situation, feel less alone, in a private situation.
Sometimes I work it so that every part of my dark lips are shadowed and my fingers seem to work for a living rather than play
My body is not a string
It is a temple of dark things
It is a ossuary filled with the dust of former lives
It is not to be dangled for cats for play
It has no puppet hands
Or puppet face
It smiles because it sees you smile
And she frowns when she sees you laugh
It is alive
The misfortune you hope her body will bring her is shame
I hope it will bring other people enlightenment
The fault is not in her
The fault is in the malicious, villainous, caricature of man who is hallow and made of maddening bells
Every time you disturb him he rings in announcement "This lady I had once an intimate relationship and she abused me. Here is her punishment."
We are all cavernous tunnels with lights to shoot out of the pins and needles sensational feelings we do not desire this but we must desire to be freed from being owned by this
We all think we're exempted from shame until we are ashamed
There are no exemptions, only more bells
They ring, until background noise renders them obsolete to us

it's not fair
that my brown eyed boy
is being treated like a toy
he's barely begun
and the sun
won't rise
if he doesn't shine
although he'll never
be mine
I wish he'd never lose
hope
I'll mope until
he smiles once more
and I'll never shut the door
for my brown eyed boy



-j.m

"We walk upon the brown"*
Giver of life,
"We walk upon the brown"
Fertile mother earth,
"We walk upon the brown"
She feeds upon us when gone,
"We walk upon the brown"
We strolled on deaths mattress
So many below, for soon we will
Be one of those, while others
"Walk upon the brown"
Mother earth  feasts on death below.

Wren

Who’s team is she on, the brown pawn?
Magical thinking and double-speed blinking can’t help me now
Standing tall, I pushed her to fall
Now I cry, sob and all

I laid her down like a lever
Lost last words, because I didn’t believe her
Took her out by my king and sword
Then masked the crime scene on on the board

But she was mine, right to her core!
She was my chance to regain my *****
Brown on the outside but I should have known better
I was playing the win/loose game, however









Karma caught me with it’s decree
Now I’m ******, and doomed is me
I should have asked what’s under her clothes
But I knocked her down and broke her nose

Regret is nothing but the wish to be free
Perhaps that’s why she came to me
In order to test where I stand and what I’d do
Maybe, just maybe, I’d need the upper hand over you

Hedging is for wussies so I bet my hen
Then I bent down beside her to find her name is Wren
I helped her back up to stand on her base
And told her I’m sorry right to her face







I walked away and thought to myself
Why only her, why nobody else?
Because if I were her I would have brought my whole squad
Could’ve stood a chance, for the love of God!

I compose myself to answer my question
She came alone because that was her intention
A lone brown pawn, in a checkered domain
Oh, I knocked her out, but she left me slain

I turn back around to touch Wren’s face
The brown mirage, in a black and white place
More brown than beige, and way darker than cream
Wren was fire, and looking at me!








My hen in the balance, I learn who I am
**** playing games, show skin if you can!
I lost my hen on my subsequent move
They took down my king, plus another few

It was a great game from the start, a match for the books
All ‘cause that pawn on the board with her looks
Brown on the outside, black if you squint
Real to the bone, if you get my drift

Now that i’m looking, her aura is green
Just like mine, captain of the the former reigning team
I thought I was white, now I know I was wrong
My skin is cream coloured, hers, you know, is brown









We have but one mini-conversation
While I try to decide if she’s Indian or Asian
I didnt take notes, but it went like this
Before she smiled and withheld her kiss  

I ask her “who is the black team? and why am I so angry?”
“I guess you just lost it” Wren said to me blankly
“Why did i loose it?” I asked in return
“Because your a bird, with lots to learn”

I rack my mind to know what she sees
Tigers and lions on a gold leash!
The sky with cherry kisses, flamingoes and geese
She sees the whole game before her, and each piece








I rack my mind to just know what I see
It’s only what I want to see and believe
I play a challenging game of monochrome
Instead of being like Wren and knowing my home

But back to my chess game, time to celebrate the opponent
The black team won, if you hadn’t noticed
I join the party and find Wren’s brothers there
First I see four, then three, then more pieces in pairs!

“Oh no, what now? how did this happen?” I yell
“I already lost, so it’s a bad day in a nutshell”
Wren gathered my hen as the blacks and browns cheered  
I stood by and waited, feeling all weird








In exchange for my hen she tried give me cash
I took offence, as if she called me white trash
But I needed the money, I gamble too much
So I left the party politely in a rush

I was already in search of my next game
When a moment of reasoning flashed through my brain
Wren was a pawn with no seat at the table
She was only looking for game to win if she’s able

Skin means nothing, brown black or cream
I slowly learn this as I reflect on Wren and her team
Sometimes I see her,  the pawn that I hurt
Brave as a knight and perched on a rook








When know what to do I’ll make my move
The miracle of chess is the chance to improve
I wonder if cardinals and bluebirds get along
And I wonder if they’d let a swan sing their songs

If one day I meet Wren again, face to face
I’ll invite her to my square, she can sit in my space
She may call me names, only fair I guess
Then I’ll challenge her to a game of chess

Welcome to the dystopian town.
No sign of life anymore
The houses are red and the air is brown.

No monarch to rule with a crown.
You will find bodies lying near every door
Welcome to the dystopian town.

You are allowed to frown.
But there is no one alive to blame anymore
The houses are red and the air is brown.

You can try making your way to downtown.
But, there is nothing left worth going there for
Welcome to the dystopian town.

You will see more bodies with their faces down.
While inside you will feel broken, numb and sore
The houses are red and the air is brown.

The sky is dark grey and brown.
Hope is not an option anymore
Welcome to the dystopian town.
The houses are red and the air is brown.

Oh, the reality.
How different it looks from Clogdance.
Bereft of the muck and the mush,
It looked overdone and suffocating.

Gilbert thought Clogdance was too much.
Well, Gilbert never wore glasses.
And, Gilbert had an amalgamate of yellow and blue,
Iris.

He’d always dreamt of the dullness.
And, the blindingly searing colours,
Of Clogdance were just not the right cup for him.

So, Gilbert walked fast.
And, Gilbert walked far.
To find the bubble to break out of and move into the alternate,
Reality.

Gilbert had wanted just the normalcy.
A right dosage to appreciate his otherwise
Worthless an existence, too languid.
Bright, and pricking and smothering.
The colours forever, was leered into his skin,
In the days of Clogdance,
Gilbert believed.

Well, Gilbert walked faster.
And Gilbert walked farther.
Hoping to live the numbness to retreat to the searing bright,
Gilbert did never stop,
nor turn around and look back.

Gilbert walked for forty years,
Through the white shores of Paradiso
To Teal Whale like water Wholes,
Carved into and flowing in shapes.

Gilbert shut his eyes.
Gilbert thought he’d be blinded soon.
Gilbert disagreed with all the logic and science
That Clogdance had to sacrifice.
Sloppy Gods and their hermitage taste buds too bland,
And corroded off,
Off the ability to taste any,
Had simply maddened Gilbert.

Gilbert wanted to live.
Gilbert wanted to live without the charity of the old Gods.
Gilbert wanted to, just Live.
Gilbert walked fatigued,
But, steady and stable.
Gilbert’s brown Wolf-like curls were silver streaks
in the darkness too slow.
Gilbert stopped.
Gilbert inhaled.
Gilbert sat down,
And, then he slept for an year-long.

He woke up in the Sahara, on Earth.

All around, Gilbert saw the streaks reflecting his youth.
Of an era past,
in the deal for greed.
Or a plain, pleasant contentment,
Gilbert thought.
The brown jet.
Unending dunes of a beautiful radiant Brown,
Gilbert found no green, or white,lest his own grey discoloured strands now.

Brown and brown,
and brown and dull,
Gilbert widened his eyes at the thought.
Gilbert gasped and groaned
in his new-found Mortality.

Gilbert panted and heaved aloud,
For water, warmth and comfort.
For a little colour to fuel
his faint ‘browned’ life.

Gilbert crawled in the dunes of Sahara for two years.
None an oasis did he find,
So forth,
He died.

To be buried deeper into the merciless dust.
Of a heavier Legacy.

Brown with the Brown,
Gilbert died Unknown.

And, young.
And, dull.
And, a mortal.

And, none knew
What ate Gilbert Clogdance.

brought the brown little squirel an acorn aloof
fall has many different browns
walnuts, chestnuts and nuts
pine cone brown and dry leaf brown
wreath of brown
mud spread on the sole of my shoes as I paddled through  the pumpkin filled fields
pumpkins shone on me like the sun of the dry brown soil
as I stepped on the dried leaves rustling with grief
autumn has many different browns
cinnamon brown and the tree trunk brown
wreath of brown
the dry purple lavenders are now wet with my tears that come from my dry brown heart
the brown sorrow
Wrath of my soul
life has many different sorrows
Wreath of sorrows

A tan makes you thinner.
A tan makes those curves seem firmer.
It'll disguise your stretch marks.
White is "pasty".
It's ok, you don't have to bake in the sun.

She looks down at her milky white skin,
Passed down through her mothers line.
A natural English rose.
All those years of battling the sun in her youth.
The only colour she got ranged from pink to searing red.

So a spray tan it is.
Now she has that "healthy glow".
In the mirror she sees all the tricks of the eye.
Now she looks how she's "supposed to".
She fits the shape of brown.

Her skin covered in the chemical concoction.
Does it look too fake?
She doesn't know, but that's ok
No one else knows either, this is the norm.
And she fits the shape of brown.

She looks at her stretch marks.
She used to be uncomfortable about them.
Her adult daughter liked them,
She called them shiny, silvery.  Now a light brown.
But she fits the shape of brown.

She fits into the shape
That society has molded her into.
She fits into society.
No longer that big white sore thumb.
She fits the shape of brown.

One size fit all?

I WHISPERED, "I am too young,"
And then, "I am old enough";
Wherefore I threw a penny
To find out if I might love.
"Go and love, go and love, young man,
If the lady be young and fair."
Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny,
I am looped in the loops of her hair.
O love is the crooked thing,
There is nobody wise enough
To find out all that is in it,
For he would be thinking of love
Till the stars had run away
And the shadows eaten the moon.
Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny,
One cannot begin it too soon.

It was 98'.
No, it was 99'.
That was the year.
Yeah, that was the year.

I had just landed abroad and knew no one.
Well, I was there with my girlfriend, Page.

I knew her.

We had to get out of the states.
There was nothing for us there.
We were drowning in that nothingness - that lacking future.

Cookie cutters everywhere.

Everything I saw was like an outline of something that had already happened.
I couldn't sleep.
I couldn't ****.
I could barely call my parents to let them know what I was doing.

Nothing really.

Floating downward like a leaf broken from its stem.
I was scared.
I'll admit it.
I was terrified of the next four years.
Twenty-five seemed so far away and so close, all at the same time.

We had a found an apartment to live in while in the U.S.
We were lucky because people we met later on said it was hell trying to find a place after arriving.
I was never too good at that stuff anyway.
I always felt like people were trying to cheat me or something.

It was small.
You would have said you loved it, but secretly hated it.
One could barely stand in the shower.
Want to spread your arms wide?

Forget about it.

There was a balcony though and you could watch the street traffic from above.
People look so small when your high up.
Down the street, there was a large theatre where they filmed movies.
I rarely saw them shooting, but I could tell it was a good place to.
It was beautiful at night when the lampposts would flicker on, orange spilling on the street.
Everything was damp in the Fall when we first arrived.

"What do you want to do today?" I asked her. She was laying face down on the bed.
Whenever she was hungover, she would do that.
All the covers and pillows over her face, blocking out the world and its light.
I did the same thing, so I couldn't really say much.
We were hungover a lot those first couple months.
Then came the jobs and everything changed...mostly.

She moaned something that I couldn't understand.
I was standing by the window, staring at the pigeons and crows perched on the roof across from us.
They had made a little nest under one of the shingles.
Clever little ******'s.

"Look at those things," I said.
The coffee I was drinking was bitter and made from crystals.
It gave me a headache, but it was cheap and we were broke.
I stepped back to get a better look at their nest and knocked an empty beer bottle around.

She moaned again and rose up from bed, kind of like a stretching kitten or a cat.
Her back was arched like a crescent moon and she stunk of ***** and Sprite.
The blankets were twisted and crumpled and she was tangled in them like a fly in a spiders web.
I went into the kitchen and poured out my coffee, thinking of what to do with the day.

"Breakfast?" she asked me from bed.
My back was to her, but I knew she wanted me to make it.
I put the electric stove on and opened the refrigerator.

"No eggs," I said back to her, "I'll be right back."

She moaned and slithered back into bed.
I threw my jacket and slippers on and made my way downstairs.

"Dobry den," I said to the cashier.
He was a tiny vietnamese man with a extremely high pitched voice.
I struggled to stifle a laugh every time I came in.

"Dobry den," he said back, sounding like air escaping from a balloon.

"Dear God," I thought, "How does his voice box do it?"

I went straight to the eggs, pretending to cough.
All around me were packaged sweets and rotten vegetables and fruit.
There were half loaves of brown, stale bread wrapped lazily in thin plastic.
Canned beans, noodle packets, and cardboard infused orange juice lined the shelves.
Where were the ******* eggs?
We needed milk too.
Trying to drink that crystalized coffee without it was torture.
I don't even know how I did it earlier.
"I must be getting used to the taste..." I thought.

I opened the single refrigerator they had in the place.
It was stocked with loosely packaged cheese, milk, beer, and soda.
There they were, those ******* eggs, right next to the yogurt.
I looked at the expiration date of a small carton of chocolate milk and winced.
"Someone could die here if they weren't careful," I whispered to myself.

"Everyding O.K.?" I heard the cashier squeak behind me.
I turned and nodded and showed him the eggs.
He was suspicious I was stealing something.
It was ironic.
I put the eggs on the counter and handed over what the cash register told me.

"There you go," I said and handed him the 58 crown in exact change.

"Děkuji," he peeped.

His voice sounded like a stuffed animal.
I nodded, smiled, and quickly got the hell out of there.

"You know the guy that works at the shop across the street?" I asked the body still in bed.
Well, she was up now, back up against the wall with her laptop on her lap.
"You mean the guy that has the voice of a little girl?"
"Exactly. I was just in there - getting these eggs - and I nearly laughed in his face."
"That's mean," she frowned, staring at her laptop.
Many of our conversations were with some kind of electronic device in between us.
We needed to work on that.
"I didn't laugh at him directly."
She smiled and nodded and moved down the bed a little more.
Only her head was resting on the pillow.
I cracked two eggs and let them sizzle there in the butter and the salt.

"So, what do you want to do today?" I asked Page, "It's not too cold out. We could go on a walk."
"Where?"
"I don't know. Over the bridge and maybe down by the water."
"It's going to be so cold," she shivered.
"I was just out there in slippers and a t-shirt and I was fine."
"That's because you're so big. I'm tiny. I don't get as much blood flow."

I flipped the two eggs and looked down at them.
Golden and burnt slightly around the edges.
******* perfect.
Now, just gotta wait a little on the other side and make sure to not let the yolk harden.
I hated that more than anything in the world.
Well, that and hearing **** poor excuses like it being too cold.
It was nice out.
She'd be fine.

"Come on," I sighed. I did that a lot. "It'll be fun."
She looked up at me from her computer with a dead look in her eye.
"What?" I asked her.
"You're such a...nerd," she said.
"No I'm not."
"You're so weird. Some of the things you say sometimes..."
"Like what?"
"Let's go on a walk."
She exaggerated the word walk.
I laughed and knew I was being a little too excited about a walk.
"Yeah. So? What are you doing? You're just laying there doing nothing."
"It's my day off," she scoffed, jokingly.

We were unemployed.
Everyday was a day off.
This was not something to bring up.
It was touchy subject.
One had to go about it...delicately.

"We need to find jobs," I stated, "And we can probably ask around or look for signs in windows."

"Oh JESUS," she gagged, coughing and diving back under the covers.

"I'm just thinking ahead so we can stay here. There's got to be something out there we can do."

"Like what?" she asked, her voice muffled by blankets.

"I don't know...something," I mumbled, trailing off as I flipped one of the eggs, "Perfect."

After breakfast, Page finally got out of bed and took a shower.
I tried to sneak in there with her, but, like I said before, one could barely fit themselves in there.
We compromised to have *** on the bed, though I did miss doing it in the shower.
As Page got dressed, I watched her slip those thin black stockings on, half reading a magazine.
I had gotten a subscription to The Review because I was trying to become a writer.
I thought, maybe if I read the stuff getting published - even the bad **** - it'll help.
Later, I realized, this was a terrible idea, but I enjoyed the magazine all the same.
Page finished getting dressed.
I jumped into whatever clothes were on the floor and didn't stink.
Then, we were out the door on Anna Letenske street, looking at the tram, downhill.


"I can see my breath," Page said, "It's cold..."

"Alright," I said as both of us ran across the street, "It's a little cold."

"But it's ok because I'm glad were out of the house."

"If we would have festered there any longer, we would have stayed in there all day."

"And missed this beautiful day," she said mocking me, putting both of her arms in the air.

The sky was gray and overcast and a single black crow flew over us, roof to roof.
No one was out, really.
It was Sunday and no one ever really came out on Sundays.
From the few czech friends I had, they explained to me this was the day to get drunk and cook.

"Far different then what people think in the States to do," I remember telling him.
"What do you do, my friend?" he had asked. He always called me my friend.
It was a nice thing to do since we had only known each other a couple weeks.
"Well," I explained to him, "Some people go to church to pray to God."
He laughed when I said this and said, "HA! God? How many people believe in God there?"
I had heard through the news and some Wikipedia research Prague was mostly atheist.
"A good amount, I'm pretty sure."
"That's silly," he scoffed, "Silly is word, right?"
"Yep. A word as any other."
"I like that word. What else do they do on Sunday?"
"A lot of people watch football. Not like soccer but with..."
"I know what you talk about," he said, cutting me off, "With the ball shaped like egg?"
I nodded, "Yes, the one with the egg shaped ball. It's popular in the Fall on Sundays."
"And what is Fall?" he asked.
You can see our relationship was really based on questions and answers.
He was a good guy, though I could never pronounce his name right.
There was a specific z in there somewhere where one had to dig their tongue under their teeth.
Lots of breath and vibration that Americans were never asked or trained to do.
Every czech I met said our language was a high contradiction.
Extremely complex in grammar and spelling, but spoken with such sloth.
I don't know if they used the word sloth.
I just like the word.

As we waited for the tram, I noticed the burnt orange and red blood leaves on the ground.
"Where had they come from?" I wondered. There were no trees on the street.
Must be from the park down the block, the one with the big church and the square.
There were lines of trees there used as leaning posts for the bums and junkies as they waited.
What they were waiting for, I never knew.
They just looked to be waiting for something.
I kicked a leaf into the street from the small island platform for the tram.
It swept up into the air a couple inches, and then instantly, was swept away by a passing car.
I watched as it wavered in the air, settling down the block in the middle of the road.

"Where's this trammm," Page complained.
Whenever it was cold out, her complaining level multiplied by a million.
"Should be coming soon. Check the schedule."
"Too cold," she said, "Need to keep my hands in my pockets."
I shook my head and looked at the schedule. It said it would be there at 11:35.
"11:35," I told her, still looking at the schedule. There was a strange cross over the day of Sunday.
"You mad?"
"No," I said turning to her, "I just want to have a nice day and its hard when you're upset."
"I'm not upset," she said, her teeth chattering behind her lips.
"Complaining I mean. We can go back home if it's really too cold. It's right there."
"No," she looked down, "Let's go out for a bit. I just don't know how long I'll last."
"Ok," I shrugged.
I looked up the street and saw our tram coming; number 11.
"There it is," I said.
"Thank God," Page exhaled, "I feel like I'm about to die."

Even the tram was sparse with people.
An empty handle of cheap liquor rattled in the back somewhere.
I heard it rock back and forth against the legs of a metal seat.
"Someone had a night last night," I thought, "Hope that's not mine."
We had gone to some dark bar with a lot of stairs going down - all I really recall.
Beer was so **** cheap there and there was always so much of it, one got very drunk easily.
I couldn't even really remember who we met or why we went there.
When everything's a blur in the morning you have two choices:
Feel guilty about how much you drank, lie around, and do nothing or,
Leave it be, try not to think about it, and try and find your passport and cell phone.

We made our transfer at the 22 and rode downhill.
Page looked like she was going to be sick.
Her sunglasses were solid black and I couldn't see her eyes, but her face was flushed and green.
"You alright?" I asked her.
"I'm fine," she said, "Just need to get off of this tram. Feel like I'm going to be sick."
"You look it."
"Really?" she asked.
"Yeah, a little bit."
"Let's get off at the park with the fountain. I don't want to puke here."
"Ok," I said, smiling, "We'll get off after this stop."

We sat down on one of the benches that circled around the fountain.
It was empty and Page was confused why.
"Maybe to save money?" I suggested.
"What? It's just water."
"Well, you gotta' pump the water up there and then filter it back out. Costs money."
"Costs crown," she corrected me.
"Same thing," I said, putting my arm around her, "There's no one here today."
"I know why," she stated, flatly.
"Why?"
"Because it's collllllllld and it's Sunday and only foreigner's would go out on a day like this."
I scanned the park and noticed that most of the faces there were probably not Czech.
"****," I muttered, "You may be right."
"I know I am," she said, wiggling her chin down into her jacket, "We're...crzzzy."
"We're what?" I asked. I couldn't hear her through her jacket.
She just shook her head back and forth and looked forward, not wanting to move from the warmth.
Dogs were scattered around the brown green grass with their owners.
Some were playing catch with sticks or *****, but others were just following behind their owner's.
I watched as one took a crap in the center of the walkway near the street.
Its owner was typing something on their phone, ignoring what was happening in front of him.
After the dog finished, the owner looked down at the crap, looked around, then slunk off.

"Did you see that?" I asked Page, pointing to where the owner had left the mess.
"Yeah," she nodded, "So gross. That would never fly in the states."
"You'd get shoulder tackled by some park security guard and thrown in jail."
"And be given a fat ticket," she said, coughing a little, "Let's get out of here."
"Yeah," I agreed, "And watch for any **** on the way out of here."

We made our way out of the park and down the street where the 22 continues on to the center.
"Let's not go into the center. Let's walk along the water's edge and maybe up to the bridge."
"Ok," I said, "That's a good idea." I didn't want to get stuck in that mass of tourists.
I could tell Page didn't either. I think she was afraid she might puke on a huddle of them.
We turned down a side street before the large grocery store and avoided a herd of people.
The cobble stones were wet and slick, glistening from a small sliver of sunlight through the clouds.
Page walked ahead.
Sometimes, when we walked downtown in the older parts of Prague, we would walk alone.
Not because we were fighting or anything like that; it was all very natural.
I would walk ahead because I saw something and she would either come with or not.
She would do the same and we both knew that we wouldn't go too far without the other.
I think we both knew that we would be back after seeing what we had wanted to see.
One could call it trust - one could call it a lot of things - but this was not really spoken about.
We knew we would be back after some time and had seen what we had wanted to.
Thinking about this, I watched her look up at the peeling paint of the old buildings.
Her thick black hair waved back and forth behind her plum colored pea coat.
Page would usually bring a camera and take pictures of these things, but she had forgotten it.
I wished she hadn't.
It was turning out to be such a beautiful day.

We made it to the Vlatva river and leaned over the railing, looking down at the water.
Floating there were empty beer bottles and plastic soda jugs.
The water was brown, murky, and looked like someone had dumped a large bag of dirt in there.
There was nothing very romantic about it, which one would think if you saw it in a picture.
"The water looks disgusting," Page said.
"That it does, but look at the bridge. It looks pretty good right

Brown lived at such a lofty farm
  That everyone for miles could see
His lantern when he did his chores
  In winter after half-past three.

And many must have seen him make
  His wild descent from there one night,
‘Cross lots, ‘cross walls, ‘cross everything,
  Describing rings of lantern light.

Between the house and barn the gale

And blew him out on the icy crust
  That cased the world, and he was gone!

Walls were all buried, trees were few:
  He saw no stay unless he stove
A hole in somewhere with his heel.
  But though repeatedly he strove

And stamped and said things to himself,
  And sometimes something seemed to yield,
He gained no foothold, but pursued

Sometimes he came with arms outspread
  Like wings, revolving in the scene
Upon his longer axis, and
  With no small dignity of mien.

Faster or slower as he chanced,
  Sitting or standing as he chose,
According as he feared to risk
  His neck, or thought to spare his clothes,

He never let the lantern drop.

The figures he described with it,
  “I wonder what those signals are

Brown makes at such an hour of night!
  He’s celebrating something strange.
I wonder if he’s sold his farm,
  Or been made Master of the Grange.”

He reeled, he lurched, he bobbed, he checked;
  He fell and made the lantern rattle
(But saved the light from going out.)

Incredulous of his own bad luck.
  And then becoming reconciled
To everything, he gave it up
  And came down like a coasting child.

“Well—I—be—” that was all he said,
  As standing in the river road,
He looked back up the slippery *****
  (Two miles it was) to his abode.

Sometimes as an authority

Should say our stock was petered out,
  And this is my sincere reply:

Yankees are what they always were.
  Don’t think Brown ever gave up hope
Of getting home again because
  He couldn’t climb that slippery *****;

Or even thought of standing there
  Until the January thaw
Should take the polish off the crust.

And then went round it on his feet,
  After the manner of our stock;
Not much concerned for those to whom,
  At that particular time o’clock,

It must have looked as if the course
  He steered was really straight away
From that which he was headed for—
  Not much concerned for them, I say:

No more so than became a man—

I’ve kept Brown standing in the cold
  While I invested him with reasons;

But now he snapped his eyes three times;
  Then shook his lantern, saying, “Ile’s
’Bout out!” and took the long way home
  By road, a matter of several miles.