William EvansBlackest Night #6 (2010)
the rings are / just trinkets / solid, black / empty vice without a / betrothed finger / to strangle / so I guess death be / like that too / because a casket / just a box until a / hero fills out / the dimensions / like air in an ever shrinking / space / no wonder Hal / and Barry ain't tryin' to / go back when / the rings start / whispering nostalgia / of the empty / heartbreak / they once shared and everybody / dead now / or dead again / I guess is the proper / nomenclature / wouldn't want / to disrespect the way a / white hero can / rise so quickly / from the eternity / where the black / heroes swim / long enough to develop / gills or schools / of tombstones / like fish but I still / get the way / that Green Lantern / hitched a chain around / The Flash's / chest and held on / for dear life (for the / moment) and / let Flash enter the / speedforce before they / entered another / grave and while / I never befell an / accident that rendered / me the fastest / man alive I have ran / fast enough to keep / me breathing / even while my friends / became death and / decaying versions / of someone I once loved / and how easy / an argument to make / that heroes you knew / in life are no longer / living so what right do / you have to still see / the blue entity on this side / of the longboxes / I guess if a ring / comes for me, at least / I know I've got / good company or at least / a school of water logged / heroes who / never got another rebirth / or #1 with their / name on the / cover slightly larger / than the white author / who deemed them / worth living Abolitionist Daisy Fitzroy of Bioshock Infinite Tells Me The Cost of Things
The Night Before She Dies Baby boy, I don't know what to do with the glistening neck of an innocent any more than the exposed breastplate of a man who branded me, if I'm the one still clutching the blade, so I guess I treat them both like an extra voice crawling around in my head that needs to be carved out until I am a hollow spell, a red river the girls who don't smile, play in until their hair drips like a bleeding sunset. I loved a man once, or rather, I let him love me long enough for him to open my shackles. I grabbed a pistol, thanked him by emptying his guilt at close range. It was messy, but it decorated my favorite dress. Maybe if we take the factory back tomorrow, I'll let you take me dancing in it and we can pretend to love their music while we swing our breezy bodies over their empty gazes from the soaked earth. They baptized me when I was little, ya know, and I don't mean little as in young, I mean little as in I still thought the Lady of the house loved me like a daughter and not a toy to clutch during the night. Or a pet who came when called and rubbed my belt-worn back against her pearl stockings. I didn't kill the lady, didn't ever raise a fist in her holy glare. Still ain’t met a dead white woman worth giving up the sky for. Still haven’t prepared my body for the bronzing and spectacle to signal their victory. They don’t get to live in a world where I ain’t branded their forehead with my crosshairs or wrapped a scarlet ribbon ‘round Their neck like a promise I was keeping. Cause ain’t that what real beauty is, baby? Ain’t blood spilled for the sake of the blood being mine to keep, the shade that looks best on me? Wouldn’t you want to be on the arm of the Belle of the Ball, before we wash the conquest from our unbridled hair. |
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William Evans is a writer from Columbus, OH and the founder of the Writing Wrongs Poetry Slam (September 2008) and Callaloo Fellow.
In addition to being the Editor-in-Chief of Blacknerdproblems.com, William has published two collections of poetry on Penmanship Books with a third collection "Still Can't Do My Daughter's Hair," on Button Poetry in late 2017. His work can be found online or forthcoming in Winter Tangerine, Muzzle Magazine, The Offing, Union Station Magazine and other online publications.
In addition to being the Editor-in-Chief of Blacknerdproblems.com, William has published two collections of poetry on Penmanship Books with a third collection "Still Can't Do My Daughter's Hair," on Button Poetry in late 2017. His work can be found online or forthcoming in Winter Tangerine, Muzzle Magazine, The Offing, Union Station Magazine and other online publications.
