Damn You, Alice Walker
After Alice Walker
I sit at my desk
sifting through volumes.
Emotions have welled
without warning,
awakened from a depth unrecognized,
and with one line
break past all my barriers,
dimpling the corners of each worn page.
Your words
have made a sieve of me.
I mine my murky remainders,
praying they possess nuggets
of value.
I lunch on your wisdom
as nothing else will stay down –
there is such a riot in my spirit.
If I could talk to you
I would not recognize the words from my mouth.
I would only hope to see in you
a possibility in me,
another who found herself rooted in red clay,
dwarfed by pines,
yet branching to make my landscape
more beautiful.
Nellesa Walthour is a choreographer, dance educator, actress and caregiver. Poetry provides a creative outlet with less obvious sweating.
The Marbled Sigh 