by Bri Watts I placed my feet on the couch, right ankle over left - second toe longer than the first, skinny and stretched, smelling slightly of vinegar. my hands beneath my head, elbows pointing in opposite directions, hair connecting my arms and shoulders, breasts quarrelling, fighting to get as far away from one … Continue reading Well
by Bri Watts It almost seemed like they were standing in peaceful protest: bare, interminable, still, between white packed snow and the faint color of black mountains and mostly blue sky, a sigh of red; expecting to be set on fire - with ease as eucalyptus trees are adapted to survive, thrive, in heat, in … Continue reading US
by Bri Watts Why they don’t wonder what they look like from the sky? How come all they do is work still? Where they learn ta’ steal from? Why they don’t carry each other? How come they heavy? Why they don’t sing like we used to? How come they can’t fly? Why they can’t hear … Continue reading Bird View
by Issy Beatriz Mejia I come from beautiful Caribbean roots I was raised by the trees I often climbed I am made of the plátanos Dominicans so often eat And I mirror the color of the limoncillos we’d eat on the balcon I speak the Spanish that my ancestors’ colonizers taught us I am shackled … Continue reading All Black is Beautiful
by Bri Watts I was full of laughter before I was full of insecurity. “You must laugh a lot. People who laugh a lot have wrinkles around their mouth; they call them laugh lines.” Some guy at a gas station said this to me. That was the beginning. I went home, looked in the mirror, … Continue reading Outside In
By Brittany Watts-Hendrix I’m good at nearly burning down kitchens, trying to make tofu for the first time cause you can only eat soft food for a week & ramen ain’t vegetarian. I’m good at holding hands and going to bathrooms, and corners in hospitals to cry, after 4 months of therapy and years of … Continue reading Care-Taker
By Brittany Watts-Hendrix An almost-black, brown womyn carries a walking stick, to counterbalance the bag thrown over her shoulder. Her head and neck sit slightly forward, to compensate for weight remaining, directing attention to an almost-brown, white boy sitting. His hands in his lap and feet under his bum. They hold one another with their … Continue reading An Old Roadway 1880, Oil on Canvas George Innes
By A Babydoll It’s fear that does it. Not of death or of hell Fear of not knowing what choice to make. It’s looking at the line between the known and unknown and accepting it must be crossed. It makes men cross, And suffer loss The attempt to cross the line with all their marbles … Continue reading On Trusting God
By Brittany Watts-Hendrix I have stopped worrying about how to come to bed, - fully clothed or ugly naked - because you always mock me. Like the time I brought a mirror to you, and you put paint all over it, made funny faces. I rarely laugh when you dare me to take myself less … Continue reading A Bitter Letter to the Love of My Life
By Brittany Watts-Hendrix In a head on collision, there is no going back. You often wonder if it’s too late to go back to the kitchen, where you should’ve learned to chicken head. Then, you consider if chicken head is too specific a reference to blackness, and if the depth of kitchen will go over … Continue reading Mourning a Young Black Girl Lost
