Gospel of the Misunderstood

I want to be the blade striking
knotted brown, to kiss the nape of any hunger;
American beautyberry or rutted cane, warm branch
of man pinning me here in mute study. To be an ache
in the breast of a burst jelly is what I wanted, vine-slick
and torrid in summer’s greed, pressing my fears against
the light of the lonely. Nameless, I haunt for god and love
in extinct places, curve myself inside desire’s eye and drink.
All peeled vermillion, all caught promise. Again all-seeing, and finally.
To be seen. Is what I wanted. To trawl the sleep of his body.
To make a burning room of this mouth. Skinned eager
with spiderbite and holy. Split-pink, drunken. Choked quiet,
as life unfolds its sticky wings in me. Snuffing me sweetly.

Isn’t this love? To walk hand in hand toward the humid dark,
enter the ghost web of the hungry, to consider some wants
were not meant to be understood. Some women.
The way my brother prays I’ll still find a man to divine me,
and my father tells me lazy women will never be loved.
Like today’s new trumpet pushing its bright flower
in my slutty way. The slow voice of its angel hissing breathless:
No. He is not here. He is not here. He is nowhere.

by Safiya Sinclair