hearsay
by Renia White
OK so you are telling me the girl dared say
鈥淚 can鈥檛 just let you have my life,
not like that, your honor鈥�
and he sentenced her to a bedazzled tightrope
and a room without a window, and a son
that doesn鈥檛 know her name?聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 middle passage
for this? think the girl doesn鈥檛 know her own
shame? given that face she wears? think she doesn鈥檛
know where she is ain鈥檛 where she was put down
to begin with?聽 聽 聽 聽 聽 聽that her first season was
someone else鈥檚 harvest?
some people get to want and need
and be met in it.聽 聽 聽 聽some just the mouth,
just the teeth
some eat and they say
鈥渨hy all the hunger?鈥�
is a poet and writing instructor from the East Coast. She earned聽her BA from Howard University and her MFA from Cornell University, where聽she also taught. Her work has been recognized by the likes of the Hurston/Wright聽Foundation, Sonora Review, and Indiana Review, and also appears or is forthcoming聽in The Offing, Slice, Poetry Daily, Ruminate, Witness, The Southampton Review, and聽elsewhere. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.