I feel like I should be somewhere

writing a poem of protest

declaring that the target

placed on black men

in this decade

is ridiculous

I should be somewhere

using my pen for them,

women with no voice

dying inside because they can’t

scream me too

I should be somewhere

organizing a protest about

closing the achievement gap

which shouldn’t even exist

I mean we built the

                pyramids

except I can only arrange

every stanza into the shape of you

and then the words betray me

because they don’t weigh enough

              to carry what I feel for you

& maybe this is a protest

maybe admitting that I am a black woman

who knows more than lust and has tasted

the pulp of love on her tongue is riotous

maybe this truth is dangerously revolutionary

              when the scent of you filled my nostrils

               it felt like I was breathing for the first       

               time

& maybe when

you freeze time to remind me that

I am both human & divine

is a form of radical resistance because

               my mother

               and her mother

               and her mother

were never able to express

or fully experience a love like this

maybe I am an activist

& this poem is a rally

               in the name of love

“I should be somewhere” appears in she’s come undone Nia Mora’s debut poetry collection.

Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash