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We love poetry by Uva Coles…As Seen in the Basin

black woman

As Seen in the Basin

 

Yesterday

I

was so damn

preoccupied

with the weight

of it…

The way it

pressed against

once taut skin.

The way

crow’s feet

spread

w i d e r

sign-languaged

and announced

that history

had been

authored there.

The way it

rendered my tits

unconcerned

with expected levity.

The way

my skin

grew freckled

with hefty story

behaved like

plucked

but forgotten

fruit.

How it

would bend in,

give in

too eagerly

beneath a lover’s

resigned touch.

How it

refused (or maybe forgot)

to resist

push back

 show

some semblance of

girlish will.

Yesterday

I

was so damn

preoccupied

with the weight

of it…

The way I

tried to cover

time’s footprint

with hues of youth…

bright, crimson pencils

and

clove-colored pressed powders

concealing evidence

of laughing, then

living,

loving,

wanting,

losing,

and laughing again.

The way

I

spray painted

grey strands

with blue-black pretense.

But

today

I found myself

an accidental passerby

before a pool of expectant water

settled in a basin

an unexpected mirror

and I

caught her

looking back

so full

of

laughing then,

living,

loving,

wanting,

losing,

and laughing again.

And I

found myself

nodding at her

bowing my head

examining,

tracing

the patterns etched into

the edges of her eyes

smiling

after hearing

(for the first time)

a crow’s staccato caws

warning

I ought to be

grateful

for

my  mother’s mother’s mother’s

gifts

skin, tits, lips, smile,

even lines

(parenthesis that holds the eyes steady)

the anchoring

the centering

the becoming

the paperweight

of bloodline

and time

borrowed

or

bestowed.

 

Copyright © 2021 by Uva Coles

 

Uva Coles is a professional keynote speaker and writer, and her work has been featured in the Philadelphia Business Journal and The Inquirer, among other publications. She is also a guest columnist for Al Dia News and a recurring bilingual (Spanish/English) television guest commentator and analyst on inclusive issues for Telemundo, and NBC. A native of the Republic of Panama, she is an orgullosa/proud Afro-Latina immigrant who now lives in Delaware with her husband and two sons.

 

 

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