Lost my Voice? Of Course
—for Beanie*
Lost my voice?
Of course.
You said “Poems of
love and flowers are
a luxury the Revolution
cannot afford.”
Here are the warm and juicy
vocal cords,
slithery,
from my throat.
Allow me to press them upon
your fingers,
as you have pressed
that bloody voice of yours
in places it could not know
to speak,
nor how to trust.
Alice Walker
from Her Blue Body Everything We Know
Harvest Books, 1991
*A childhood bully
.