Poem-a-Day Day 16 Prompt: Write a last line poem: take the last line of your previous poem and use it to start this one. (I cheated and went back two days. Yesterday’s was too poem-specific.)
Recite it every night before bed:
I am the daughter of
the daughter of
the daughter. Of
Ruth, of Lura, of
Mary Emma.
I am the daughter of
the nephew of
the granddaughter. Of
Richard, of Elizabeth, of
Catherine who was called Mammy.
Remember these slantwise lines,
that take you back and back.
This is the map home,
the twisted strands
of the genetic story.
Recite their names,
these other, twisting lines,
like rivers on the map, like poetry:
Sojourner, Susan B,
Uncle Walt and lonely Emily,
Harriet who was called Moses.
Lines on the palm,
on the map,
in the blood,
roads and rivers,
a point drawn in a distant past
raying forward to the point
drawn in this moment.
The truth is formed
in concurrent past and future
as the lines are connected,
given shade and shape and weight.
Remember this. Remember.
Mockingbird Chronicles 