Wo-Woman (Conspicuous)

Inspired by Conspicuous by Anthony Boone

Performed at Into the Mind Artist Talk with Anthony Boone and Patricia Fox Jersey City, NJ - October 2018

I sat down and told chance, “I am not a poet. I am not a poet.”
I am inconsiderate, underwhelming, underwhelmed,
beyond help
beyond and above any creative of a doubt.
I am not a poet, or a writer or singer.
I am not a poet, I do not speak written words.
I am not here to rhyme in couplets. Tell you this and that,
and how life is loveless.
And how it gets tiring
Or how it can all be awe
inspiring

I am not here to be obvious and condescending
Bending and blending
Truths into something you can digest.
I have no flow so you know this isn’t a show
I’m not here to make you feel better
Or to school anyone in prose

I’m just here to say something about
Flowers
How they stand how they keep tall
How they falter how they fall
How their grounds are firm
And feet planted to stay
The same way a woman stands in front of you…

Arms out and chest abreast
ahead alive
and revelled and revealed in pride
Wo-woman...

We both are stared at and we both stare back
With levels of disdain and easily masked pain
Wo-woman and flowers start to look the same

We both sit in the pools and bunches
To protect each other from strangers’ hands
Plucked from our grounds
Removed from our self-wrought bounds

We ask, why do you look, why do you gawk?

The gold of the sun continues to give
Allowing each of us to group and grow

I have so many petals and pieces and veins
But not much to say
Not much to explain
I only describe what’s given
I’m not here to show what’s hidden
Or what lays in rhythm
Or what pays in beauty
Or what plays as beauty
What makes its beauty
How do we live in beauty

Because I am not a poet,
I am not a poet.

Look at the flowers and how they bleed
A selfish act beyond that
You feel the veins
You can see my veins
With blossomed beads
The same color as guayaba paste
Or of berry deep tones
Against lightly tanned skin
And muscles and bones

I find sanctuary
Little slices of refuge
And spots of curled lips
Petals as tips
Like applying rouge
And dark colored lipsticks

I cannot be

I cannot be a poet

I have no words to speak to you
and
I still don’t have anything to tell you.