Diaspora's Daughter

She scoops the red Mississippi dirt
Into her hand, holds it close to her mouth
And whispers
I am
The throws it up into the wind
It doubles back to kiss her
And continues it's journey

She catches a breeze in her nostrils
That tell of 'something to come' and the knees starts to aching
And she starts to run
To weigh down things
That would be blown away from a strong wind
While  Jr. Boy, who's playing in the Dirt ask,
" MuDeah what you doing?"
"Storm a coming child, I feels it in the wind ,
feels it in my bones, now you run along."

He wipes the dirt from his hands and dusts it from his clothes ,
inhales the country breeze and he does not see one sign of bad weather
But sure enough
the clouds began to gather.

She musta' been a magic woman, he reminisces
She knew things before things began ,
She could predict the weather
and the actions of men,
where did she come from
And who am I to come from her?

The hills of Louisiana, rise and fall
Painting a picture of shapes and curves that look like
The body of a big, fat woman
Polite and inviting but dangerously unknown
The unexplored terrain, that test your courage
and welcomes you home

The swamps of Louisiana tell a different tale ,
she is a conjurer
A woman with a veil over her face
She takes it back to the ships
That docked on the river Mississippi
To congo square, with drumming and dancing
To Natchez at the slave market.
She takes a pill called Jesus
To help her make it through the times
She drinks some liquor called jim crow
That daily makes her lose her mind
She dips some juju from a tin she carries with her
At all times
She gets what she wants, what all women need
She gets her some peace of mind.

She speaks Creole, ' mwen move'
When her soul is unsettled, her tongue be a Mississippi knife
In a juke joint fight, each word a slice.
She jump the gulf of Mexico, to the Caribbean Sea
In her mind, she go back to Haiti, to reminisce the old times
The old ways, of slaves that were holding on
To the root of the root, to Africa and God
She fits into, the scenery, like a chameleon cause
Everywhere is home to her.
She be a Diaspora Daughter ,
loving the Blackness of her skin