Brotha

---

I too am scared of endings.

Vultures gather like smoke over us.

So bruised it seems the whippings

burnt us, birthed us black. At night

we exchange melodies on rose-oil breaths

to survive the smoke by becoming

each other’s air and painting the face

of heaven so fine no one will worship

the garish sun and its demands for labor,

and labor’s demands for dark skin

to bare its harsh rays. Let’s dance

into our own shadows, vogueing

to the beats of rhythm’s prayer,

werking this earth’s axis like

it’s how we pay our bills because

by it we pay reverence to each other,

twerking into night’s curtain

between days, bouncing our behinds

into its dark matter where

flesh like ours safely blends in

and is no longer just our own

but one with the universe’s endless sky.