Family Tied

This poem was written by DeShara Suggs-Joe in a 12-Month Poetry Collection Generator taught by Angel Nafis.

Poetry collection synopsis: A List of Justified Longings questions what is the cumulation of want, of willing oneself toward the implausible target of being whole. It interrogates the distance between heaven and hell while wondering if earth is the best God has to offer. Still, it allows room for an unrelenting grace because this book knows that no one is perfect as they appear. It confronts its ghosts and dares to call them by name. It is longing, personified.

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Family Tied

If I wallow remind me of the mommas
who came up to their necks

in grief & still rose golden God won’t
you wash away my woe I want

to surrender to the memories of me
almost right I didn’t make my father

proud I made him
a rediscovered ghost begging for exalt

He stockpiled saliva to anoint
himself & slew my tongue desperately

through the unripe mud How
dare a man who didn’t name

me try to wrangle my teeth
lasso my knees into a bend

until they’re blueblack & weeping
like my mother before