The break of day
Jack sat in
An office that
Would change his
Life and —
I can’t help
But think of the
Hymn that says
The Blood ‘dun signed my name.
A door which would open
For all those
Coming behind
And remembering
Who was in front.
With this signing
With this mountain climbing
This sport that
Puts together ball and bat
Gave us legacy
Of Black and Athlete
To stand up on
Two feet
And there always
Needs to be a
Dodger Blue 42.
-JBHarris
(Written on Jackie Robinson Day, 4.10.2024)
Pray for the Prophet:
because she’ll have
to go anyway—
she’ll have to go
when it it is safer
to stay.
To be brave enough to say
what but no one else will say.
Pray for the Prophet:
because she’ll have
to go anyway —
laying bear life and limb
dredging up love,
speaking of love
that soon will be again
bearing her own sin
for the sake of safety
and the equipping
of those after her.
Pray for Prophet:
she have to go
anyway —
head spinning
from the words
And worlds within it
from the ancestors
Who beckon –
The Christ who reckons –
from the God who has
given her the ability
to go forward
When nothing is
in front of her,
but yet nothing is certain.
Pray for Prophet:
she’ll have to go anyway,
keeping her wits about her
Her heart in broken flux.
Knowing anything
And everything
Commanded my hand
Held close by time
Bearing what must
Be given back
Planting the juniper trees
And catching jars of
Moonlight.
Hands and knees
Bend to pray
Knowing the price
Of the vision
Will be her voice
and obedience —
Even when both shake.
Pray for the Prophet:
for she must go anyway.
-JBHarris, 2.28.24
One time
I dined with
The prophet
Elijah,
The one known to
Call down fire
And from Mt. Carmel
one time heard him shout —
Don’t let white people
In your house!
They’ll take your stuff
And lay you clean
‘cross your own couch!
From time and memorial
I have heard his words
On my travel a
And with every
Dismissing swing
Of a judge’s gavel.
With every closed door
For every denial
For every repossession
For every health decline
For every bill
That’s due you
Said is mine.
For every city which burned
For Oscarville submerged
For the Devil’s Punch bowl
And the missing among
Skid Row
Don’t let white people
In your house!
They’ll take your stuff
And lay you clean
‘cross your own couch!
For every perm that went bad
For every time we are counted
As more Black than friend
That we were made
Both means and ends.
The old folks say
Wisdom whispers
And foolishness shouts
And when you
See evil coming
You gotta put it out!
The old prophets
Tell young warriors
Watched by the scholars
To be careful of
The uncolored
in large groups
During streetlight hours.
We snake charm
And lion tame
Like Claude McKay say
To the breathe fire
To ignite plantations
Lingering in mountains
And minds —
Making the god
Of this world
Reveal its ultimate form!
We listened to
Both The Cross
& The Lynching Tree
Understanding the
World both sells,
Barters,
and has stolen
From me.
Don’t let white people
In your house,
They’ll take your stuff
And lay you clean
‘cross your own couch!
-JBHarris, 3.30.24
Note: this is a French phrase that means between us.
He said I am all he wants.
I ask,
“Can you hold fire?”
He smiled.
And opened his hand.
-JBHarris, 12.8.23
My beginning is
from a place of
no return.
From a place
by which has
death in every turn,
but has given me
parents stronger
than any hurricane wind!
My beginning is
from a place
unlike any other
in a town solidly
built and Black
giving protection
to those whose
very name is Till
I am the daughter
of the slave
and the sharecropper,
the scholar,
and the fisherman—
the prayer warrior,
and the pool hustler.
Indeed,
M
I
Crooked letter,
crooked letter
I
Crooked letter
Crooked letter
I
Humpback
Humpback
I.
I am the harvest
of the slave
And the free man —
of many nights of
widow walking
of avoiding Klansmen
and policeman stalking,
I am from a place
that birthed Fannie Lou Hamer.
From a place
is exotic and forgotten.
That is both
Rich and poor
That you will
always have to
wipe your feet
before you come
in my front door !
The beginning of my line
Was the end of the line
for many.
Where the chains
still rattle when
you listen to the trees
But I can still walk
in the grass
and dirt with ease.
The song says
when I think of home, I think of a place…
in this place I know
as no other
And I can feel
in my bones
I am never to stay long.
My price has been paid
to put my crown on,
In this dirt here
can’t hold me long .
Again: #HereSheCome
The year of 2024 marks a decade I will have been engaged in this career as a writer. A decade since I wrote my first book, 8 years as a blogger, 7 years as doing internet writing coaching, 5 years as a podcaster and 4 years on TikTok (whatjayesaid2.0).
I have a readership that is respectable, and I am proud of the platforms I have been allowed to build, maintain and expand. I mean, the WHATJAYESAID: THE PODCAST came from a poll on my TikTok account!
This year feels different. It is different! I am less afraid of what people will say about what I write down–the compulsion to say it over takes any fear. I guess that means I am believing in not just my talent–but myself.
This is my 5th year doing 30 DAYS OF JAYE.
These pieces are from a place of resilience, power, and –healing. At the culmination of this comes my first anthology.
This anthology will have over 200 pages.
Which is wild! I am refusing to shrink, and seeing what I need to do in order to push my talent in the direction needed. A decade in this game, and I haven’t even hit my stride yet!
I love that for me.
As we chug towards the end of the year, I am so proud of myself! I have made progress in this writing career, getting books out of the phone and onto shelves and into hands!
Yet, as I begin to prepare for 2024, I had this idea. The idea you ask?
An ANTHOLOGY.
If asked what inspired this, that answer is complicated! I am committed to doing the work of poetry, this work of writing, and I believe I have a big enough body of work (a literary corpus for the academics of this space), where I can now have an anthology!
In this anthology will be a the last 4 years of the work created for National Poetry Month—from 2020-2023. This collection will also include the 30 pieces for April 2024.
When I did a tentative count for what will be included in this anthology, here was the breakdown:
2019: 90 couplets
2020: 30 poems
2021: 30 poems
2022: 30 poems
2023: 30 poems
2024: 30 poems
This is 240 poems (150 poems and 90 couplets – (2 line poems)).
This will be ready for purchase by June 2024, right after or before my 43rd birthday! Pre-order info will be released in December 2023!
This is incredible, I am so proud of myself! And there is more to come!
This year was introspective for me.
I was forced to think about things I was scared to, while making room for myself. I think the presumption is poets will have this never-empty, never-ending reservoir to soothe or settle those that read our thoughts.
I’m always humbled for it by anyone who reads my work or is inspired by it. Sometimes the wells we pull from for others, are dug by our own hands–watered by own tears!
Yet, we write.
We create.
We serve. Make no mistake: a poet is a servant. Perhaps this is why Baldwin said it is a horrible tragedy when a nation ceases to produce poets.
The poet remembers what everyone else forgets—and gives light when all is lost. On this, perhaps, hangs humanity.
There is peace
In me which
Is as deep as
The mind of God
When you are near….
Having neither rival nor equal.
-JBH, 6/2021
She will desire peace at the
Cost of war
Being both prisoner and soldier
Believing if she fought harder
Bleed more
And denied her own
Thirst for more
Hunger for justice
and sight for more
Then she will be enough
When her body no longer
Blushes with your coming
Has peace with your going
And all love becomes an act.
The weapons of he warfare
Time, body energy
Have been taken as spoils
And she will do all allowed
To pull herself back together
Your touch no longer soothes.
The heat that was there has
Cooled…
With the turning of
Her head…the love is dead.
she will put self above love—
and nothing else will matter.
JBHarris, 11.20.20
I Breathe Fire 