by Ophelia Knight
In every ghetto there is a being nicknamed SEXY ________
@ 8:30am they rise
mixing Florida water and watching as the rhinestones fall
from thrifted applebottom jeans
they have grandmothers that kneel in church pews & call on
their singular version of Jehovah
taking baths in milk
clouded with lavender bubble bath
tendrils of kanekalon dyed 1 – F27/22
“being alive and being a woman” is chanted subliminally while hips thrust
gathering materials to pass down through generations
all of the men in our families have hidden 4 Lokos in their back seats
spending the last of their coins on Forty Ounces
& loose cigarettes
holding plastic bags as carriers of community
we have convinced ourselves
sorrow does not look like this