African Woman
Beat your drum
African Woman
Beat your Drum
Beat
Beat
Beat
Beat
Beaten
Caribbean
Woman
Where
your drum?
Tears be the language that we
speak
For ages we have held
Our Bellies
Our Groanings
Our Moanings
As we silently weep
Bellies filled with tears
Voiceless
Throat choked with tears
Voice less
Mouths empty of words
Voice less
Mind withered into slavery
Voiceless
This is the language that we
speak
This is the language of those
made weak
By Oppressors
By Suppressors
By Repressors
Silenced like a Lamb
The dignity of who I am
Stripped away
Taken
Again and again
And again; again
Body............broken
My essence raped
My beauty made but a barter’s
bargain
My daughters lie
They lie
With a tongue tortured
With a tongue taught
With a torn and split tongue
That licks the ear
The ear that cannot hear
Their cries
My cries
Our cries
Because it is filled with the
sound of the truth of his lies
Who will speak of her hurt?
The scars where her heart they
burnt
The ashes of a mind turned
Speak Mother Earth
Your Daughter’s fears
Cry Mother
For her minds blood spilt
Groan Mother
For surely that ear
Will hear
The Sound
Of a voice murdered on your
ground
But where is the voice of
mother?
Has she just been an echo all
along?
The whisper of a voice long
dead
But still travailing on?
Crying Momma
Moaning Mumma
Groaning Mamma
We are slaughtered
As you have been martyred
In the name of
The father
The son
And the Holy Spirit
But Momma’s words have no say
Mamma’s words are long dead
Momma has no tongue
Mumma has no speech
No one can hear Mamma
And the truth that she
preach....
Is denied
So Mummy cries
So Mommy bawls
So Mammy lets her never ending
ghostly tears
Fall
Can you hear?
Can you hear the whisper?
Can you hear the whisper of a
voice screaming?
No
No you cannot
No you cannot hear
No you cannot hear the cries
Your ear
Your ear has been turned off
Your ear has been tuned off the
frequency
Your ear has been turned off
the frequency of me
And I
And I am silence
And I am silenced by you
And I am silenced by you who
took my voice
And I am silenced by you who
took my voice, no more.
Copyright © 2014
Jade Hicks