The most contagious lie
on the Internet is
that Black women
are undesirable —
unwanted,
not beautiful,
not trustworthy—
needing to be in our more natural state.
The road to perdition
is always paved
with eyelashes
and weave,
and HR approved hair colors.
It is the steady robbery
of person and self
And the marriage therein
that tells you that
the world can only end
where you begin!
the road to perdition
Is paved with stilettos
that echo hallways
we are not supposed
to be in,
the shunning of
our own selves
from our own selves
into places meant
to be margin.
Our place supposed to be uncomfortable.
Pleasure and purity
Never being ours—
walking these narrow roads
with a few gates, and
even fewer allies, and
no light, and
we were supposed
to just endure that
with smiles in our faces
because Black girls
are made for hard times.
And the only way
to find redemption
among this back door
To Hell’s Jericho Road
is to abandon all hope
of all ye who enter here [the World]
as Dante said,
but at the same time l—
who put us here?
it was Oracle Malcolm,
who told us
who looked like him,
“Who told you to hate yourself?”
and if a Black woman
does not hate herself,
Then,
how can she truly be Black?
But if Blackness holds
everything and
everything is inside Blackness
that means we hold
all power in our very hands!
You see perdition
Was never ours,
It’s was never
ours to be sent,
This road we were
Given is not ours to cement!
It for the cause of those
Who do not know who
They are and will never accept
Who we are
That we continue to forfeit
Our own selves for their selves!
But understand
The key to our CELL,
is never FOR SALE.
The road to Perdition
They say
Is paved with
good intentions.
But at the same time
Heaven is within us
so perdition is never made
for us, and is a holding spot
for those who don’t know
who they are …
besides the darkest trick the devil ever played was to to make the world believe he doesn’t exist, but
Black
women
always
have.
-JBHarris, 4.26.2024
I Breathe Fire 