The Beginning of Social Protest

After Audre Lorde

this is true: i carried a fetus in my middle.

and then another grown alive in my middle.

this is true: risk and rare refuge for children like mine.

i decide if a seed will sprout in my middle.

this is true: they said no pain! and no time!

then cut me right in the middle.

this is true: the scalpel made agony. i begged, anything.

went home with a bill—one finger right in the middle.

this is true: rent bullies us back to work too soon.

i bend at the crease that marks my middle.

this is true: white parties in white buildings see over my body.

the lie is the search for ground right in the middle.

this is true: i fracture and burst for the children. so much

about the heart, but nothing breaks like my middle.

this is true: my knees sink in the mud.

when i wait for an end, yomalis, i drown in the middle.

Yomalis Lourdes Rosario (she/her) is a Black Dominican poet & teacher who was born and raised in Washington Heights, NYC. Her work has been supported by Brooklyn Poets as well as Martha’s Vineyard Institute for Creative Writing. She writes about creativity, spirituality, & liberation in her newsletter Letters From the Root.