Category: Pain

What Am I Supposed to Feel? NaPoWriMo#28

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Some of the plants in my best friend’s plant therapy room. Photo Credit: Tremaine L. Loadholt

What Am I Supposed To Feel?

I feel nothing.
I’m supposed to feel
something . . .
Something is supposed to
hit me, shake me,
break me into
some semblance of
acceptance — 
isn’t it?

But
there’s nothing there.
I want to be happy.
I want to feel relieved.
I want to celebrate like
the majority of this
world but I know
this is far from over.
The damage is done
and really, how do
we undo it?

Where can we start?
What needs to take place?
So many movements.
So many lives lost
and this one victory
tap-dances on our hearts
and it feels . . . 
other-worldly — as if
the programming of its
occurrence hasn’t reached
the highest ratings and
we’re still waiting for
the go-ahead to
breathe.

I still have unearthed
breaths tucked in from
unjustified killings
stabbing me in
my gut — I can’t find
an endpoint.
There is no safe
zone.

And people laugh
and clap their hands
loudly and join along
in the grand hoopla
of it all while I
shelter-in-place with my
damaged spirit.

Tell me, what am I
supposed to feel?
I carry this verdict
with me, bury it in
my faulty vision, blink
away the madness of it
all, then settle on
the unclear view.

“It’s a start,” someone
says and I can’t help
but hear my trapped voice
rebut, “It’s your start.
I’m finished.”

Justice delayed is justice denied. — William E. Gladstone

Originally published on Medium.

Last Night, I Watched the Salt-N-Pepa Biopic and Thought of You

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All-knowing Moon

And how odd was the image of you that crept into the recesses of my mind as I looked on at a bond that began quickly, kept up with the changing of the times over the years, then pent itself into harm’s way by backing into a proverbial wall. Years later, that wall was torn down and those same souls who’d bonded quickly built the strength of their love up to a level that none of us can touch.

That is Salt. That is Pepa.

That is missing you. That is remembering graphic pictures sent to my phone. Skintight jeans cuffed at the ankles. Spaghetti strap tops. Fishnet stockings covering naked legs and supple ass cheeks. No panties . . . You were a voluptuous work of modern-day art and I salivated at your will.

Beckoned and Called.

I was younger then. Way younger. And I hungered for you. Those flicks kept me satisfied when distance had been too much to bear. I knew you were probably watching the biopic last night too and being overly-critical.

I was Salt. You were Pepa. And the difference between us versus them is we had lust pockets purging our friendship into a nasty ball while we allowed our feelings to turn into something bigger. I fell too hard, though. Something I was prone to doing many moons ago.

You pointed that out. My kind of love was not what you had been seeking. Still, you threw your bait at me and I swam to it like an eager fish. I had many nets. If I could have chosen, all of them would have caught you.

We didn’t part ways like adults should have. You stopped talking to me when you figured out the way I love could never satisfy you. I found that out five years later after dreading another ghost. It’s hard tracing the tracks of someone who never leaves footprints.

The music of our youth reached my ears and “The First Ladies of Hip Hop” reminded me of you and what I put you through and what you put me through and I wanted to pull them both into an embrace and tell them how brave they are for shooting the shit publicly and apologizing to one another for their wrongdoings.

We could NEVER be that mature.