The Kingdom Belongs to a Child
by Cashavelly
Long-Haired Mare
When my daughter was barely sixteen,
I began to wonder of all she’d seen.
Before the sun rose on an icy morn’,
I woke to the screams of my darlin’ first born.
With my dagger in hand, I threw open the door,
saw a man had taken her to the floor.
Promise never tend my grave.
Take the long-haired mare and go far, far away.
The man had the eyes of my love.
My husband, my one who’d stolen enough.
A red sun rose on the love I’d divest.
I pushed the dagger through his chest.
Promise never tend my grave.
Take the long-haired mare and go far, far away.
My daughter wailed, “I’m among the damned.”
“No, no, girl. I’ve untied your hands.”
I held a long white thread
pulled from the lily laced on her bed.
Promise never tend my grave.
Take the long-haired mare and go far, far away.
By sundown, I stood alone
in a sunken cell of ashen stone.
Before the gallows, I wept myself clean
for my only daughter had been set free.
Promise never tend my grave.
Take the long-haired mare and go far, far away.
Emory
In our yard, we made a pyre.
Stacked wood, threw in the books,
burning lines of evil and good.
Went in the house to get our baby.
She ran; it was a game.
Promised candy and to us she came.
We held her back, threw in the cradle.
She asked to play with her teddy bear.
“Not now, you’re too sick and frail.”
“It’s not that we don’t love you, baby.
Doctor says we have no choice.”
It seems God is tossing a coin.
We stared, the fire rocked her,
holding pails of kerosene, oil.
The smell was milk gone sour
the day we turned her back to soil.
Made of Sand
I can’t say it.
The sun’s setting scarlet.
You’ll find I’m made of sand,
a sparrow in your hand.
Don’t go away tonight.
My dress is dirty.
My lips are cracking.
I watch you from the street,
a feline in heat.
Don’t go away tonight.
Wait for me,
tonight.
I have tin wings
in this icy rain.
You are a shelter,
a coal shed discovered.
Don’t go away tonight.
I made you thin twine
from the wet white pine.
Pull me through your door.
Hear lily-white roars.
Don’t go away tonight.
Wait for me,
tonight.
Iodine
My son, he cannot hear me.
In the end, I’ll speak his last words,
soak my baby’s shirt in lye,
and mend his injuries with thread and iodine.
My baby boy had brown eyes.
In daylight, he cried.
I ran, I ran, I ran
to kneel at his side.
My son, he cannot hear me.
In the end, I’ll speak his last words,
soak my baby’s shirt in lye,
and mend his injuries with thread and iodine.
The day turns into midnight
as more sons fall to genocide.
I hold, I hold, I hold
black blooms all my life.
A mother’s voice is the ocean’s tide
and can drown out your armies riled.
I stand, I stand, I stand
and will survive.
My son, he cannot hear me.
In the end, I’ll speak his last words,
soak my baby’s shirt in lye,
and mend his injuries with thread and iodine.
Jesus Dies Every Time
Bullet in the grass—she pulled it loose
from its descent to the middle of the earth.
She buries it in her ancestral wound
given her the right of her birth.
She gives the bullet to her father and mother,
who refuse to hold what is not their own.
Confined at home, blood-letting her body.
A crimson pail as all she owns.
Jesus dies every time.
Still she cuts off her hands.
Her teeth tearing graves
of new land.
When her lover falls to the floor,
she puts the bullet ‘tween his broken teeth.
He vows carry it an eternity.
Her howls replace all for which he speaks.
Jesus dies every time.
Still she cuts off her hands.
Her teeth tearing graves
of new land.
Amputation will not save her
from the bullet, the sum of her worth.
She suffers a coward’s burden
on her descent to the middle of the earth.
Jesus dies every time.
Still she cuts off her hands.
Her teeth tearing graves
of new land.
Breakwater
This water can smother no fire
Miscarried
Hemopheliac
Cutthroat
Ruby Waters
Steel is the mirror of regret.
Face dripping down your shoulder,
following you across the room
on a Sunday after he turned cold
and the sea was full of black gold.
This water can smother no fire
Miscarried
Hemopheliac
Cutthroat
Ruby Waters
Breakwater’s Red Tongue
Ships sinking down my throat and yours.
A leak was sprung in each of ink.
What had no voice was never said.
I was alone after he turned cold
and the sea was full of black gold.
Breakwater’s Red Tongue
The ocean
Pink Dress
I have scratches on my legs
from the briars on the trail
where the weeds were overgrown and waist-high
and I could tell no one had been there in awhile.
I’d been there once before
with my first lover
where we made a bed of thorns
and I’ve been finding them since we’ve been over.
Wear your pink dress.
Clean up your mess.
From the ridge, I couldn’t see the river
without a slide of my foot down the ledge
and I caught myself down on the ground
and that’s where I found wide-eyed Connie under the hedge.
Wear your pink dress.
Clean up your mess.
Connie doesn’t look like herself any longer.
Eyelet dress and a daisy by her ear,
posed in a casket, going lower and lower
and her mommy cursing the Holy Father.
Wear your pink dress.
Clean up your mess.
Now I can’t go anywhere anymore
without a daddy or a brother.
I dream of Connie standing at my door.
She says there will never be a day when I’m without her.
Wear your pink dress.
Clean up your mess.
May 5th
You grew like a vine.
You grew inside.
You grew a short time.
Made a womb your tomb.
I made no bed
wherein you could sleep.
I did not bring silk and tin.
No sleep tights, no fist fights.
No milk will be offered.
Praying hands, fodder.
Not bought, only earned.
I am cold mountain stone.
Should we meet behind the curtain,
I will open you like a fan.
It’s nice to know you again.
You are not weak. Learn to speak.
The Nobleman and the Queen
Silver fists come flying.
If I could open them, I’d lay inside and sleep.
The vines into the ruins
and at the door a beggarwoman turning,
“Have you seen the mad bull idling,
whose spine rises the edge of an arrow feather?”
Swaying into the moonlight,
that is my father I scarcely know anymore.
Father’s a nobleman.
Mother’s a queen.
Do not let me die before I...
Forgive me, I was there no longer.
The great white lily wilting in his breath.
My tears are not weapons.
I’ve grown boughs carrying the weight of snow and ice.
His bold body staggers,
pulsing down to the ivy ‘round his legs.
In my arms, he is shards of rain,
collected by a child’s hand.
My father, his breath and blood,
drain into the cradle of my marrow.
Father’s a nobleman.
Mother’s a queen.
Do not let me die before I...
Dangling gravedigger lashes.
Love is not dead beneath the mask of earth.
The beggarwoman burdens me,
howling for my return to the ruin.
Father’s a nobleman.
Mother’s a queen.
Do not let me die before I...
29 Bells
Here the profit comes
and the hard cash
my husband becomes.
The man got away
who as good sparked
the coal seam’s methane.
My love is gone
and here come my children
the coal baron will pawn.
I ring a bell
and that man hears
every strike swell.
It rings in the night,
it rings all day,
it rings in this fray,
it rings like children
drowning in the lake.