Between ourselves

Once when I walked into a room / my eyes would seek out the one or two black faces / for contact or reassurance or a sign / I was not alone / now walking into rooms full of black faces / that would destroy me for any difference / where shall my eyes look? / Once it was easy to know / who were my people. / If we were stripped of all pretense / to our strength / and our flesh was cut away / the sun would bleach all our bones / as white / as the face of my black mother / was bleached white by gold / or Orishala / and how / does not measure me? / I do not believe / our wants have made all our lies / holy. / Under the sun on the shores of Elimina / a black man sold the woman who carried / my grandmother in her belly / he was paid with bright yellow coins / that shone in the evening sun / and in the faces of her sons and daughters. / When I see that brother behind my eyes / his irises are bloodless and without colour / his tongue clicks like yellow coins / tossed up on this shore / where we share the same corner / of an alien and corrupted heaven / and whenever I try to eat / the words / of easy blackness as salvation / I taste the colour / of my grandmother’s first betrayal. / I do not believe / our wants / have made our lies / holy. / But I do not whistle his name at the shrine of Shopana / I do not bring down the rosy juices of death upon him / nor forget Orishala / is called the god of whiteness / who works in the dark wombs of night / forming the shapes we all wear / so that even the cripples and dwarfs and albinos / are sacred worshipers / when the boiled corn is offered. / Humility lies / in the face of history / I have forgiven myself / for him / for the white meat / we all consumed in secret / before we were born / we shared the same meal / when you impale me / upon your lances of narrow blackness / before you hear my heart speak / mourn your own borrowed blood / your own borrowed visions. / Do not mistake my flesh for the enemy / do not write my name in the dust / before the shrine of the god of smallpox / for we are all children of Eshu / god of chance and unpredictable / and we each wear many changes / inside our skin. / Armed with scars / healed / in many different colors / I look in my own faces / as Eshu’s daughter crying / if we do not stop killing / the other in ourselves / the self that we hate / in others / soon we shall all lie / in the same direction / and Eshidale’s priests will be very busy / they who alone can bury / all those who seek their own death / by jumping up from the ground / and landing upon their heads. / 1. Orishala: another name for Obatala, Yoruba god of creation. The worshipers of Obatala must wear white clothes and eat white food. / 2. Elimina; seaport town in Southern Ghana, founded by Portuguese traders.