My brown body is inherited
along with its jeweled head split
on a curb, blood lingering
on pavement. It is the red
birthmark of a nation.
I can’t stop clawing at my mother’s scar,
incessant legacy carved
into my flesh like initials in oak.
The body threads violence to itself,
welting wounds into offspring.
I discover the ache
but not the why or how of it.
My body remembers history
even when my brain is muddled,
as if one leg is shorter
than the other, a hobble
reminding me
this body’s belonged
to others before me.
It will see the same open casket
bear the same brown bruised face,
twisted mouth open as if to say
it remembers resistance.
