SALT
The idea was birthed into me
by my mother
who spun me in the riptide
of her womb
who sent me into the blood-sea
of adolescence, as did her mother,
and her mother before her
when Christ said, you!
You are the salt of the earth!
he was talking about women—
how the beds we lay our daughters upon
are tear-stained, sweat-soaked
Tinged with salt we were born
We live with the taste on the back of our tongues.
IN MEMORIAM
I created you, all on my own.
You were nothing
when I found you
eating black licorice alone
I took your sticky-sweet fingers
and licked them clean
That’s when you saw
what a real girl
could do.
I gave you my
shortcomings
I let you eat them like licorice
They were black, too, but not as
sweet.
Everything we give birth to
is part god, part monster
That’s what you told me
I held that with me when you’d gone.
Glint Literary Journal 