When Men Give You Wings (A Tribute to Louis Lindsay By Taitu Heron)

When men give you wings

(In Memory of Louis Lindsay)
 

(men as gatekeepers of patriarchy….police your body, curtail your mind, restrict agency, confine you to reproductive citizen for the state)

When men give you wings you can surely not but fly

I mean fairy fly

Imaginary I can’t believe fly

I mean supercatgerflagerlisticflasticflyblackgirlmagicfly

YET THERE ARE SOME WHO shit (excrete) entitlement so stink

you have to eak a different route to rise

When men give you wings to fly you smile through tears

And blast easy through storms stand injustice in the face badass like a hurricanebreezekindafly

I mean ibelieveicanflyibeliveicantouchthescky…..kindoffly

Yet there those who shit entitlement rotten

You have to cry

When men give you wings you burst thru a thousand skies

And voice the terrible woes into victories

transform political venom into legislative love

Move indebted thunder to sustainable stars

Yet there are some who shit the mud of mean

Not even an inch yuh likl bitch

You have to oops make a dodge duck a block chant more than a psalm a day

And make your peace

Because you still going to fly

When men give you wings

You become a child buss out naturally because there was no gate

Oh woman of no mental doors

Purposeful march because this space is already yours

Ancestors got your back stand rising rooted high wingspan wide

Goddess soaring whistling wind in the still fighting dust of other men wondering what just happened.

Copyright 2016 Taitu Heron 

Reprinted with permission.