African Woman is a very oral piece I will try to post an orated version of this piece over the weekend.

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