Community!

I've been so thankful that despite the recent and continual unraveling around me, I have poets and friends for support.

July and August I did month-long poetry challenges. I wasn't working, I had all day to think about my poem. It was an interesting exercise in watching, or monitoring, your process and watching it change. Undoubtedly, if you engage in even just one month-long challenge, your process will change. It's beautiful to watch, really.

Anyways. I don't believe I could sustain another month-long challenge, so I started doing these series of week-long challenges once a month. I use them to write poems for this specific project I'm working on. So it's like, I focus deeply for a week producing the poems, and I read the rest of the month and look for materials.

Here's today's poem:


Bird song


The call nearing 2am can’t seem
to dislodge itself from my ear even

after hours we’ve said good night
and I’ve rolled to the cold side

of my bed looking to fall back
into slumber. Last night I was

somewhere in Harlem, listening
to this bird sing and I know now

where women get the sorrow,
the low, guttural notes

to say You made me love you,
I didn’t want to do it, I didn’t –

and mean it. I’ve seen other sparrow-
women fly around the city with hope

caught in their beak looking to build
a nest. The wind outside sounds

a vortex, and the whistle wakes me
again, and your laughter is unraveling itself

from my memory. There is no settling,
just nights flapping wings outside

windows wondering what ifs, their weary
suppositions. The cup in our hands, unfilled.


(c) delana r.a. dameron