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In a midnight voice, arms extended,
she reads blues that lays the soul to dust.

Hands reaching upwards,
a white woman moves her fingers
calling the sky to hold these words.

The poet stands at the crossroads
where her art and family meet.
Her mother stands in the ruins
holding a bouquet of bloody music.

Slashing, sinewy phrases celebrate
the first activists who fought for freedom
with the strength that simmered
in shotgun houses next to the picking fields.

A freight train of rapid fire explosive words,
intellect the weapon, now unconcealed,
she quashes the howling and leers
from blue-veined, tobacco-stained faces.

Bloodroot and mimosa sway
to the sound of her voice.