When There Is Pain, There Are No

It's A Bad Word, 'belong.' Especially When You Put It With Somebody You Love ... You Can't Own A Human Being.

Black Literature Is Taught As Sociology, As Tolerance, Not As A Serious, Rigorous Art Form.

Only Her Tight, Tight Eyes Were Left. They Were Always Left...they Were Everything. Everything Was There, In Them...thrown, In This Way, Into The Binding Conviction That Only A Miracle Could Relieve Her, She Would Never Know Her Beauty. She Would See Only What There Was To See: The Eyes Of Other People.

In Fact Her Maturity And Blood Kinship Converted Her Passion To Fever, So It Was More Affliction Than Affection. It Literally Knocked Her Down At Night, And Raised Her Up In The Morning, For When She Dragged Herself Off To Bed, Having Spent Another Day Without His Presence, Her Heart Beat Like A Gloved Fist Against Her Ribs. And In The Morning, Long Before She Was Fully Awake, She Felt A Longing So Bitter And Tight It Yanked Her Out Of A Sleep Swept Clean Of Dreams.

Usually I Try To Be There By Six. Everything Has Been Taken Off The Walls So That There's Nothing To Arrest My Sight. On The Bed I Have Roget's Thesaurus, A Dictionary, A Bible, And A Deck Of Playing Cards.