Tag Archives: Water

Inspired by an upcoming collection of poetry, prose, and plays.

R. Person 3:21 AM on November 23, 2020
Tags: , , , , , , Water   

In The Water, He knew Them (an ancestral memory)

The waters were calm when the face peered from the deep. The sun generous on brown skin. But this was no reflection. A gasp escaped.

He never knew sea nymphs had noses, round and wide. He never thought to dream one would show up with blue locs and a full mouth. Gap between proud teeth, with terracotta smile and scales tinted burnt sienna.

Anchoring his humble boat, he sat back and pondered his sanity, because the sea nymphs he’d illustrated from the descriptions of renowned authors did not resemble his father. They did not have his mother’s mouth, or his great aunt’s cheek bones. They did not have shaved heads shaped like pharaohs. Those author’s never told tales of burnt umber eyes rippling in the Atlantic.

Figuring he’d imagined things, he peered back into the water. He glimpsed himself again, or so he thought. He faced his brother again, yet he did not. The sea nymph danced in the current just below the surface. The sea nymph shouted and sang in his native tongue.

The sea nymph’s observer sat stunned, but somehow attuned to the rhythm of underwater drums. His bare soles began to mimic the beat on the boat floor. He noticed, and stopped. He peeked over his modest boat again and grinned. The ocean heaved for the sea nymph’s kin had joined his dance. They’d flowed right into his song. The young man laughed as images of family reunions flowed into his vessel. As he watched an elder sea nymph, scales worn like sea turtle skin, her locs pale as sea froth, twist and whirl in the current created by her descendants. He was certain the first nymph was her grandson. She smiled at him through the deep blue and a gap stood proud between her teeth.

The young man’s boat, now heavy with memory, continued to sink. The young man treaded water as if trying to dance. He felt a hand graze his hand. He felt his toe balance on a current. He noticed a breath offered by the salty water. He took it and he danced as his boat descended, returning home. He danced. He forgot his feet. His clothes, heavy and sodden, floated to the depths. He darted between currents. And the sea nymphs circled his graceful descent; their movement like praises of fervent prayer. Bodily he began to glow, mud brown skin casting shadows on passing shoals; the shoals left a glimmer of their bioluminescence across his spine. The currents swam a familiar song around him as his boat’s shadow dappled his descent. He began to sing and the language was a loving kiss on his lips; a kiss he had once loved and forgotten, but now loves again. The language was his as was the sea and the people who remembered him.

Advertisement

#america, #black-stories, #fantasy, #fiction, #history, #prose, #water

R. Person 6:50 PM on August 9, 2020
Tags: , , , , , , , rest, Water   

Rest

Go to Baptism Lake

Sit on the water, take a seat

Dip your feet

That hand on your scarred back

Is an inquisitive wind

That coolness is the sin of your obedience washing away

That warmth is praise for your skin

That sunlight is not a whip

That bird song is not an alarm

That splash might be a tear

But that’s okay, it’s okay

Rest does not require strong arms

~Rahk.

#art-therapy, #black-art-matters, #black-stories, #faith, #history, #poem, #poetry, #rest, #water

R. Person 12:06 AM on April 9, 2019
Tags: , , , , , Water   

Mending

Learned at an early age
that words carry weight
only broken bone I’ve had
is being called a fag one time
too many
and there aint no cast
for that kind of injury.
Can’t set spirit the
way you set bone.
They don’t quite mend the same
but no surprise they don’t
quite bend the same either.

#grief, #lgbtqa, #poem, #poetry, #raw, #water

R. Person 5:05 PM on April 7, 2019
Tags: , , , , , , Water   

With a Note

In 2012, all I had of yours:
a whisper in the dark
a hug behind closed curtains
the questions you left me with.

They belonged to you:
That fitted-cap whisper
That capricious hug
That polluted reality.
I never wanted your things—

You gave me:
mixed whispers,
closed-curtained embraces,
subconscious kisses,
Now in broad daylight,
I lay them on your back porch.

I deserved more than your darkness.

-Rahk

#grief, #letter, #poem, #poetry, #raw, #relationships, #water

R. Person 10:32 PM on February 24, 2019
Tags: , , , , Water   

Possible Opening Scene For “Water: The Play”

Setting the Scene: Curtains open. Three women of varying ages and three men of varying ages face each other; a pair of women, a pair of men, and a pair with both. The lighting shifts from ample light to low light, mimicking the performers’ voices.

Males: We are told that we are flowers–

Females: That should bloom a certain color–

In Unison: So that we might

Male Facing Female: So that we might

Female Facing Female: So that we might

In Unison: …Be picked. We were told that we are flowers that should bloom a certain color, so that we might be picked.

Females: But why must we die for someone else’s sorry?

Males: But why must we be cut to sprout another’s smile?

In Unison: But why must we grow to bloom a certain color if we cannot die as ourselves?

Female Facing Male: I’ve lain I love you at your feet one too many times…

Female Facing Female: My I love you is not a bouquet to lay in the dirt!

Male Facing Male: My I love you is not a spider to be smashed in fear!

Female Facing Female: I’ve lain I love you at your feet one too many times…

Male Facing Female: My I love you is not a bouquet to leave unwatered.

Female Facing Male: My I love you is not a roach scurrying in the shadows!

In Unison: My I love you does not belong at your feet, but here it is again…

Female Facing Male: I expect more of you
because I see you as
a reason to believe
that love can transform
boys into men
who do not run
from hard conversations

Female Facing Female: My expectations
are not laws to imprison u
for living. U commit no crime
against me. Though,
sometimes your silence
is an ache in my stomach.
U are not my child. I cannot
carry you. Look how u shine.
I am no god to raise the sun,
though I grow from the light…

In Unison: We grow from the light.

Male Facing Male: Talk to me.
It’s the silence that
fathers this Distance.

You are not my father.

Talk to me.
Your constant silence
fathers this Doubt.

Female Facing Female: I need you to talk to me.
Your silence fathers this Distance.

What are we now?

Talk to me.
Your constant silence
fathers this Doubt.

And I am with child…

Female Facing Male: You told me
that you were my first
underneath the white light
of a blue door
on a dark night
with poems between us
knowing I had no trophy
to give you.

Male Facing Female: With years between us,
you allowed the silence
to stand. While I boasted,
certain of my place
on the empty stage
of your auditorium.

Male Facing Male: What didn’t you say
the night I caught you
considering me, smiling,
hand on cheek?

Female Facing Famale: What didn’t you say the night you clung to me,
saving your tears
to pour in my glass?

In Unison (louder): What didn’t you say the night you clung to me,
saving your tears
to pour in my glass?

Females and Male Facing Male: The same glass
we shattered on a whim,
with poems between us…

Alternate Females and Alternate Male: I did not duck
when your tears
splattered like acid
along my cheek.

Male Facing Female (with revelation): This is not the scar of friendship–

Male Facing Male (with revelation): This is not the scar of friendship–

Female Facing Female (with uncertainty): This is not the scar of friendship…

In Unison (with conviction): These are not the scars of friendship!

(Scene description and roles added to original post on February 23, 2019)

#brainstorming, #relationships, #scenes, #spoken-words, #water

R. Person 3:30 AM on February 8, 2019
Tags: , , , Water   

Talking to Myself (Brainstorming Part 1)

On the 40 minute drive to teach freshman and sophomore English, I see glimpses as I head down I-40: a darkened stage with subtle light, brown skin shrouded in various, yet harmonic, hues of blue. “In 5 miles, take Exit 206,” says Girl, my Google Maps App. (I know my way to work by now, so I just navigate for the real-time traffic updates and alternate routes.) The signal light sounds off its blinky clicks, and I see another glimpse: a gun on a nightstand, two Black men in a careful rage– then a snippet of a conversation. “Talk to me, it’s your silence that fathers this distance…” and then Girl chimes in, “In 0.9 miles, keep right to stay on Exit 206.” Before you know it, I’ve finished teaching all my classes and I’m back on the road for another 40 minutes.

I see glimpses, but it’s still unformed. “Water” has a lot to live up to. I’m hoping it will become a culmination of all the late nights and invested time. This “Water”, of which I receive fleeting glimpses, warms me like the grey-eyed grin of my grandfather. Specifically, the ‘just for me’ grin that greeted me whenever I returned home from college.

Because you spare a little time to visit whenever you can, gratitude warms me just like PaPa’s grin before Dementia dimmed it a bit. (He still reserved a smile just-for-me, even with the declining nature of the disease.) Nevertheless, thank you for reading any tiny droplet of “Rahk’s Water”. Together, we can turn these droplets into a bay. 💙

#brainstorming, #journal, #talking-to-myself, #water

R. Person 3:37 AM on February 3, 2019
Tags: , , , , , , , , Water   

Introducing “Mannah”, inspired by “Copperhead”.

Mannah never seems to notice the uneasy stares as he saunters barefoot across the street from the In & Out Mart off 56. The gas pumpers and the mail-checking neighbors never got used to seeing the young man walking with nothin’ but a pair of jeans cut off mid-thigh. He showed too much knee for a man of color. It didn’t help that he ran a lot in his earlier youth. Chasing dragonflies around the Miller pond gave him legs like an insect. His grandpa called him Grasshopper because of it. Told him, “If we judged by ‘pearances, we’d sing tale of you jumpin’ over Gabriel’s Moon.”

“Gabriel’s Moon” is a fable generations spread like butter on cornbread. The angel Gabriel had a bet with his brother, Jeffrey. Jeffrey swore that he could do a backflip over the moon if Gabriel’d just give him a hand-boost. Gabriel laughed at his lie but agreed to boost him anyway. The time came when the moon was low and hung like a witch’s smile. Lo! And Behold! Jeffrey careened up into the night sky and cleared the moon with a clumsy backflip! Gabriel boosted him but Jeffrey never quite got his footing. His left foot caught up on the last corner of the moon and that off-kilter backflip landed him square on his back. Crushed his wings all to canyon dust. He won the bet but his wings didn’t take him to heaven after that. He could only get as high as the moon when its just above the tree tops and the family always calls it Gabriel’s Moon.

Mannah, or Grasshopper when grandpa calls him, was built to clear that moon without a boost from Gabriel. All from trying to catch dragonflies on the edge of Miller’s pond. The people looked on as Mannah’s shoulder blades reflected the sun like a new penny. His skin always looked like a pre-winter leaf with the sun smiling behind it. June always called him “Pond Water” because he was just brown enough to require a bit of sunlight to see the sparse hair keen on his legs and arms and chest. Not to mention the patch, like down on a baby duck, just below the back of his neck. Save for that hair and his proud eyebrows, Mannah was bald.

He kept on heading down the path toward the old brick church. Dirt and rocks almost parting for his barefeet, like some country Moses. Humming a poem he read when he was a teenybopper, the whispers and puzzled faces becoming the baseline for his song. He felt it to his bones, but never acknowledged a thing. He never did lend an eye to those things people didn’t want him to see. Mannah didn’t wonder about the whispers covered by hands. Didn’t cast a thought to why Banjo tripped over a string whenever he came around the bend. Must not be important. If it was, someone would say something to him directly. Since no one ever did, it wasn’t a matter of life and death. When it’s a matter of life and death even dragonflies speak.

“Banjo, I swear. I put it on everything. The dragonfly spoke.” insisted Mannah.

“Grasshopper,” Banjo knew his friends grandpa, “that damn dragonfly didn’t say shit to you. Stop lying for once!”

“Did to. I was chasing him, a pretty one too. His wings were like black cobwebs carrying him around that pond. Flitting away as soon as I could get close enough to see how his backside was bluer than ol’ Ms. Carnegie’s eyes.” Mannah sat beside Banjo like a frog, hands on the tops of his feet. Banjo theorized that if Mannah used all the strength in his legs he’d probably leap over Pond-Lake County.

“That sounds like a dragonfly alright. But it don’t sound like a talking dragonfly. Did you see his mouth?” Banjo started tinkering with his guitar, a hand-me-down from his favorite uncle.

“Well if you shut up a minute I’ll tell you again. I was chasing him, like I said, and he went to the back part of Miller’s pond…where the bog is,” Mannah hopped on tiptoe in front of his companion, “but I was a kid then. I didn’t know any better.”

“You sound like you don’t know any better now; talkin ’bout a talking bug.” Banjo eyed Mannah as he leapt around. He wondered why the man never seemed to have dirt on the bottoms of his feet or sweat runnin’ down his back. He was swimmin’ stark naked in his own skin due to the southern sun. He couldn’t fathom setting a socked foot in that ground, nevermind his bare foot.

Mannah leaned against the brick wall and continued, “To get that dragonfly I started to run right into the bog and that’s when it happened. That dragonfly turned around and said, ‘Gwon now! Get!’ and I froze midstep. He sounded like Big Pa when he said it.” Mannah finally made eye contact with Banjo.

“Nigga, if you don’t get the fuck outta here. It probably was Mr. Washington yelling from the house.” Banjo’s borrowed guitar lay on the ground. Its keeper couldn’t focus on one cord when in Mannah’s presence. Quiet as its kept, Banjo just couldn’t think and play at the same time. Why Mannah made him think so hard remains a mystery.

“No, Big Pa was at this church. I know what I saw…and heard.” Mannah somehow slid down the old brick wall, without smearing his skin along its weathered surface, to sit wide-legged on the sparse grass and ample dirt. Banjo inexplicably noticed his companion’s cut-off jeans shifting, baring more skin.

“Man, I ain’t foolin with you today,” Banjo muttered in annoyance while wiping the dirt from his guitar. “I’m going to go practice some more. See if Ms. June wants a private show.”

“Ms. June is old enough to be both our grandmother’s.” Mannah didn’t move from his spot on the wall.

“I know. That’s what sweetens the tea, Grasshopper. That’s what sweetens the tea,” he winked and said, “See ya.” Banjo hurried away– glancing back once while shaking his head as Mannah rolled on his stomach. You’d think he was laying on a sleep number bed, Banjo remarked to himself. As he turned his head back towards his destination, Banjo observed that there was not a particle of dust dulling the soles of Mannah’s feet or his exposed back. Mannah’s skin was somehow untouched by the complimentary coating of dust that assaulted everything else, even clothes.

Puzzled, Banjo shook his head again. He spent more time than he’d admit to himself dwelling on that peculiar sight. He spent no time at all questioning why he noticed in the first place. Finally, Banjo stared at the path to Ms. June’s; his head was still shaking when the sun blew out.

—–*—–

Rahk.

#copperhead, #excerpt, #prose, #relationships, #scenes, #short-story, #spoken-words, #storytime, #water

R. Person 2:18 AM on January 30, 2019
Tags: , , , , , , Water   

How Preacher Got His Name (a short story)

“Preacher, when’re you gonna listen without telling the sun he shines too bright? When are you gonna listen, boy? You can talk from here to Palm Sunday until someone asks ya for the truth. Then you become mute like a reverse miracle. Shut up, sometimes, will ya? Can’t hear a tornado moan without seeing the end of days. Preacher, you better not part your lips while I’m talkin’ to ya, now. Sit back and listen. I’ma tell you why you was born Preacher Adams. I’ma tell you so you can finally hear the wind rustling the leaves around you. I’ma tell you so you stop and think for once. Stop and collect YOURSELF. Not ten percent of the world around you. I’ma tell you why your Grandma Adams named you Preacher.

“Listen now, when Grandma Adams was first born her mama named her Psalm McEvers. Remember why she named her Psalm? I told you once before…you don’t do ya? That’s cuz you were too busy talking about rainbows being figments of the human imagination just because we don’t see them all the time, or something outlandish like that. I remember, you said something about ‘human beings needing to see beauty to combat all the ugly we imagine inside ourselves. So we make up rainbows to keep living,’ you said.

“That’s why you didn’t hear me tell you about the origins of Grandma Adams’ name. That’s why I have you sitting here shutmouthed and still. And if I see that view-from-the-mountain look you get when you ain’t listening, I’ma throw one of these peeled potatoes at your forehead. If ya think I’m playing you just try me.

“Now, Grandma Adams’ mama just loved dressing up on Sundays for Palm Sunday. Ever since she was a little girl. She’d almost wet herself as she dreamed about the uniformity of all the different people coming together; singing songs and running through the pews as if they just heard tell of a homeless man walking ’round in a 3 piece suit. So she named your Grandma, ‘Psalm’, after her favorite book in the Good Book. Everybody thinks she mispelled “palm”. But no, she just wanted to remember how on those Sundays, in her finest clothes, the world made a little sense. The world looked the way it should to her. Remember that church always wore white on Palm Sunday. Even the preachers. And for some reason, bless her heart, she always thought she was dark skinned–”

“Well, I heard she thought she was black– Oops! I’m sorry, PaPa. I didn’t mean to say nothin’.

PaPa chuckles. “I know you just couldn’t help yourself. And you’re right. She thought she, and everyone around her, was black as Stacy Adams. Though, most of the people in our family and at her church were brown skinned on up to white. Hmm…always thought it was odd that there weren’t many dark skinned folks at that church. Anyways. See, you got me talkin’ instead of saying what you need to hear. Mind it this time or you gonna have wet potato peels on your head.”

Preacher laughs. “Yessir.”

“Grandma Adams’ mama always made me scratch my beard about one peculiar thing or another. But she loved seeing that black and white. Especially on this one preacher the pastor always let give the benediction, but poor brother never did have a sermon. He was the only dark skinned man there. She saw him and everybody else in all that white. She thought she was as black as that preacher who never preached. But she wasn’t. I don’t know if something was the matter with her vision…

“Then the McEvers moved near to Eden, North Carolina. I can never remember the name of the actual town…hmmm.

“Anyhow, Grandma Adams’ mama never saw all that white again on Palm Sunday. The new church just dressed in whatever fashion made them content. But she remembered all that white on her skin. She remembered all that white on that preacher on those special Sundays. She remembered the joy she felt when everything looked the way she could understand. So she named her daughter ‘Psalm’. You remember now, Preacher?”

“I sure do. She didn’t misspell her daughter’s name. She meant to name her Psalm, so she could remember the Sundays when the world was small enough to hold in her palms.”

“That’s right. So words do go in and not just out, huh? Now, you got to really listen, Preacher. See, when your daddy told Grandma Adams he got somebody pregnant she told him to “Treat that woman like he meant to get her with child.” Your daddy listened. You don’t seem to have taken after him that way. At least not yet. Though you can be taught, I see. That’s good.

“Your daddy treated your mama so good she let him name you. Unheard of ‘mongst most peole, I reckon…

“Well, on the day you was born, Grandma Adams’ randomly called your daddy and told him your mama was gonna have you a little earlier than expected. He laughed. Woo, your daddy laughed! At first. Then he remembered he was talkin’ to Psalm, Grandma Adams, and he drove all the way to your mama’s house and woke up her whole family. Heh hehheh heh! Booooy, they looked at him like he had swallowed an egg without breaking the shell! But then, your mama started having birthing pains. They scrambled to that hospital, then. Sho did. Your mama was so grateful. She had a name all picked out but she told your daddy that he could name you. Her parents almost needed a doctor themselves but they recovered well. Once they thought about it…

“Your daddy was so flustered. Lawd have mercy! He just blurted out something. And he said “Preacher!” Your mama never batted an eye. She said, “Then his name is Preacher. Preacher McEvers-Adams.”

“Your mama’s parents, your other grandparents, they were so mad. Before they stormed out, they asked him why that name of all names. And, listen now, he said, “Because Grandma Adams knew my son was gonna be born as black as the preacher my great grandmama saw on Palm Sundays. She knew he was gonna be a reason to see rainbows. Even if they are shades of imaginary black skin and white cloth. She told me all this the other day. Before she called me to get your daughter to the hospital. And then I see him, my son. And he’s just as black as the man my mama fell in love with as a child. Before she moved near Eden somewhere. That preacher looked the way she saw herself. Though she was the same complexion as me. And my Grandma Adams never knew her mama. She just knew her mama named her after the world being small enough to hold in her palm on the few days life made sense in her world of black and white. So I named him Preacher because if it weren’t for my grandma telling me to treat your daughter like I intended to get her pregnant, I would have treated her like I treated all the other women I had sex with. Then I wouldn’t love your daughter. I wouldn’t be able to name my son.”

“Preacher, them white folks ran out of that hospital room as if they’d screamed “nigger” at a Black Panther protest. And I still don’t quite understand what made them leave so ruffled. Your daddy, remember they used to call him Snake, just told the truth. Snake just told the truth. And that’s why you don’t see your other grandparents. They moved far away from Eden as they could. Moved way out of North Carolina running from the truth: Snake never intended to impregnate their daughter, your mama. And they saw their baby girl so taken with Snake that she let him name her child, their grandchild, ‘Preacher’. And your daddy never intended to get her pregnant. But he treated her like he did and she fell in love with him. Yeah, boy, your mama, Biddy-Ann…she loved your daddy. And if it won’t for Grandma Adams he would have lived up to his forbidden name. Grandma told him not to be a snake. She told him to be a man.”

“I get it PaPa. And that’s how Grandma Adams named me Preacher Adams. Cuz I’m the rainbow she imagined her mother saw when she fell in love as a child.”

“That’s right. And, like your daddy, Grandma Adams don’t want you to live up to your name. She wants you to shine through it. She wants you to imagine rainbows, Preacher. But she also wants you to speak the truth.”

“Yessir. Grandma wants me to be like my daddy. She wants me to act against my name. She don’t want me to be like a preacher, always talking and making sense, but never listening. Never truly standing shutmouthed before God because they proud. They gloat in being chosen. In answering “the call”. In being given a name, like “preacher”, and living up to the name. Instead of being silent. Changing the world for little girls who can see love in black skin. Even in a congregation of white. Great great Grandma McEvers never knew that preacher’s name. But seeing him gave her so much joy. Causing her to see black, PaPa, when she didn’t have to. Ma McEvers wasn’t crazy. She didn’t have bad sight. She saw black and white and both colors worked together to make her world make sense. You’re saying I shouldn’t be ashamed of my name, PaPa. I should be like my father. I should listen. Especially to the people who love me enough to tell me the story of how I got my name.”

“You sho is sharp, boy. Just like your Grandma Adams…”

-Rahk.

#excerpt, #memories, #prose, #short-story, #spoken-words, #storytime, #water

R. Person 6:01 AM on January 27, 2019
Tags: , , , , Water   

“Grief (When a Poem Can’t Fix It)” -raw audio

When you can’t write a poem.

When a poem can’t fix it.

When a flick of the lighter

and a pull of the cigar

and a lashing out at loved ones

can’t fix it

When sporadic sobs of faith

ripping from bellies

like plagues of moths

can’t fix it

When a prayer skips

“Don’t let it be true, Jesus”

And another prayer skips

“Don’t let it be true, Jesus”

And the prayers skip

And voices crack

like whips across Christ’s back

and questions linger

on the napes of our necks

and lifting our heads to the sky

does not loosen their hooks

And you don’t ask them

because you know the silence

resounds like his last breath

Because you know he should not have taken his last breath

And a rage storms

through the blood of kinship

And a rage storms

below the clouds of scriptures

And a question clasps hold of your eyelids

And a gaze falters at the casket

And a sweeping of the crowd jettisons a spray of questions

like bullets

like bullets

like bullets

that wail like they just lost their child

like bullets

like bullets

like bullets

that wail as if their prayers were answered incorrectly

like bullets

like bullets

burdened by too many unanswered questions

like bullets

like bullets

Who is responsible for these tears?Tears dammed by so many quesions

Tears desperate to escape the dam to prevent the flood

And a poem can’t fix it

And a prayer didn’t make it not so

And questions still haven’t been answered

And we have heard that weeping endures for a night,

But why is it that we have been forced into mourning?

#grief, #poetry, #raw, #spoken-words, #water

R. Person 12:00 PM on January 24, 2019
Tags: , , , , Water   

A Stranger’s Recollection (Excerpt from “Copperhead”)

We called her Copperhead, mainly because she didn’t have a speck of hair on her head. Everybody says she was born just that way. Although, those same folks say that Copperhead is her given name, so we take what they say with a grain of salt. Looking back, it was almost impossible not to speculate about that girl. Especially when she’d saunter silently by crowds of people as if they were tall blades of grass. Always in her own little world, distant. The quieter she was, the odder she was, and the more we speculated.

You’d hear tales, from familial hoodoo curses to divine retribution. Oh, we’d all have a go at theorizing. Especially because her old mean mama had hair to the small of her back. No natural force we’d ever heard of could shine a woman’s crown into a magic 8-ball from birth. I’m telling you, not one follicle chose to live on her scalp! Quite peculiar if you ask me.

Here I go getting sidetracked. No wonder the youth drift off every now and again when old folk talking to y’all; us old folk drift off first I bet. That’s how we get sidetracked in the first place. Now where was I—Ah. Copperhead, that’s right.

If her head was something to startle the potholes in a pool table, her body was the pool stick; straight up and down. But for some reason, you always knew she was a woman, even from behind. Androgyny loomed over her shoulder with hot breath, but womanhood took hold of her slim frame and adamantly refused to let go. Woo wee, she was skinny! And black. Just like soot. Growing up, some of the unlearned boys used to say to her, “Keep on laying out in that sun. God gonna spit and turn ya into mud.” They wished they’d never parted their lips once Copperhead struck back.

I remember my friend Smoke theorized that she got the name Copperhead due to the venom in her speech. Once you had her gaze on you, you’d swear you were tip-toeing in the woods on a quiet summer night. You’d swear you a slithering rattle sent you into fight or flight. The moment you had her attention, you knew you’d stepped off the path at the wrong time.

One concentrated sentence could bring a professional football team’s ego to the turf, and she’d never miss a step. You would think, with her being so quiet and alone all the time, that she was afraid to speak up. Those unlearned boys discovered that snakes could talk on that day. And they also discovered that no man is going to like what a snake has to say to him.

Truly, no one could say she was mean and convince a jury to confirm the allegation. No, Copperhead tended more towards honeycombs than swarming stings. But the swarms were there to protect the sweetness of their hard labor, and their queen. So, who can really blame them if you poke their hive with a stick? Imagine having worked all week, and come pay day, some fiend steals your wages—anybody would become a swarm worthy of Exodus.

Though, by now, even the strangest passersby are familiar with the local dangers. The commoners find enough kindness to warn strangers about the vipers lurking around town.

Last I heard, Copperhead rarely has to ready her infamous fangs nowadays. The people leave her to do whatever she pleases, still wary of her venom.

-Rahk.

This was originally the first chapter of the novel in the works. How does it read? Is your interest piqued? Your feedback is not only welcomed, but encouraged! Thank you. 

#copperhead, #excerpt, #prose, #short-story, #water

R. Person 3:41 AM on January 21, 2019
Tags: , Water,   

Yes, Even Men

I will not stuff my tears into my coat pocket
Or swipe them from my face
as if they burn
I will not clasp hold of the sob
banging furiously at the corners of my eyes

I will let these tears escape
like refugees from an oppressive regime
I will let these tears dampen my beard
as if a staff will part the sea
gathering unabashedly at my chin

I will not be ashamed

Death touches everyone
inappropriately

-Rahk.

#poetry, #water, #when-rahk-writes

R. Person 1:18 AM on January 12, 2019
Tags: , , Sea Turtles, Water   

Somewhere in the Oceans

Is this some new great white shark?
One that holds lightning ‘tween its teeth?
Lord, hammercy.
I could do without that
again–

Oh, it’s just those white men with Lightning in their hands again–
they like the way I look
for some invasive reason or another…

I’m just trying to get to where I’m going.
It’s been 98 years since I’ve seen my Aunt Kimaya.
She makes me smiiile.

So, go ‘head and stare if y’all must.
Just please, please point your lightning somewhere else–
it’s hard enough to see as it is.

#personification, #poetry, #sea-turtles, #water

R. Person 6:29 AM on January 6, 2019
Tags: , , Water,   

Enigmatic by Rahk

as the sky is blue
so are oceans
so are bays
so are winged things
that glide and flitter between rock
so are slithering things
that shimmer and hide beneath rock

as the sky is blue
as the oceans
as the bays
as the puddles reflecting twilight
as the robes that roll down blue black legs
as the dust glimmering on a catepillar’s dreams
as the wings
as the wings
of defiant things
flicking off the ground

as the sky is blue
so are streams and lakes and ponds
so are infants and women and boys
so are auroras undulating in brown eyes
so are turning tassels
and the timid flames of eighty-nine cent lighters
and dishonest prayer cloths
and unused bookmarks
and little girls forced to wear dresses
and little boys bruised while wearing dresses

as the sky is blue
and fluid and vast
and unafraid of its horizons
so are you

Rahk.

#excerpt, #poetry, #water, #when-rahk-writes

R. Person 5:22 AM on January 5, 2019
Tags: Bully, , , Water   

Stained Glass (Excerpt from “Copperhead”)

After a frustrating, yet moving service, Minister Bully returns to her small office to open the note she found in the church hymnal. It was folded, yet slightly exposed as the hymnal rested on the shelf of the pew in front of her.

Bully’s breath catches in her throat at the sight of her daughter’s name.

 

To: Min. Bully

From: Copperhead

Those men you share the pulpit with, they don’t intend to give you that freedom you crave. They don’t mean to give any of us freedom. And you know it. I know you know it.

You are the same woman who, with utmost certainty, declared: “Men, they mean you no harm because they don’t mean to see you as equal. Their own kindness, because that’s what they’d call it, will never let you speak as clear as the dainty glass they think you are.”

You are the mural those kind men try to cover when they recognize their true stature.

Don’t allow their kindness (because that’s what you’d call it) to leave you as melted sand. Let their so-called kindness temper you, mama. On the day stained glass speaks, it will speak with your voice.

#bully, #copperhead, #letter, #water

R. Person 8:12 AM on December 28, 2018
Tags: Water   

Rahk’s Voice, An Introduction

His voice is one you skip across a puddle or a pond with your favorite cousin. His voice is one you keep in a shoebox with the other odd things that caught your eye. His voice is lapis lazuli, too soft to set in rings, but hard enough to pierce ears. His voice is not diamond, it is not gem. His voice is rock, an arduous task to work, but I must, because his voice harmonizes with mine in its audacity.

His voice, like my own, sinks and blends within bodies of water. His voice, like my own, stands out in a sea of gravel. His voice, like my own, does not keep its shine in rings. Rather, Rahk’s voice sets best in pierced skin, or pinned to mom’s Sunday best, or resting by the heart on silver chains.

Here, I will explore Rahk’s voice. Here, I will clench my fist around it. Here, I will hold it up to the light to observe how it lusters, layers, and weighs. Here, I hope to chisel and polish Rahk’s voice into a poignantly intricate sculpture that flows like water. Over the next few days, weeks, and months, I introduce to you the unrefined voice of Rahk.

#water