I Don't Do The Things Other People

Of Course I'm A Black Writer... I'm Not Just A Black Writer, But Categories Like Black Writer, Woman Writer And Latin American Writer Aren't Marginal Anymore. We Have To Acknowledge That The Thing We Call "literature" Is More Pluralistic Now, Just As Society Ought To Be. The Melting Pot Never Worked. We Ought To Be Able To Accept On Equal Terms Everybody From The Hasidim To Walter Lippmann, From The Rastafarians To Ralph Bunche.

Here I Am Not The One To Throw Out. No One Steals My Warmth And Shoes Because I Am Small. No One Handles My Backside. No One Whinnies Like Sheep Or Goat Because I Drop In Fear And Weakness. No One Screams At The Sight Of Me. No One Watches My Body For How It Is Unseemly. With You My Body Is Pleasure Is Safe Is Belonging. I Can Never Not Have You Have Me.

Sunk In The Grass Of An Empty Lot On A Spring Saturday, I Split The Stems Of Milkweed And Thought About Ants And Peach Pits And Death And Where The World Went When I Closed My Eyes.

Wait, Wait, Wait, Wait. Don't Try To Write Through It, To Force It. Many Do, But That Won't Work. Just Wait, It Will Come.

It's Bliss When You Give Up All That Stuff That Separates You From Other Human Beings. It's Hard, But You Break Down All That Stuff.