China Cabinets

Written after interviewing the daughter of a survivor of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre.

She told me that growing up

Grief was a China Cabinet

And in her neighborhood

Everybody ate off plastic

Because it was safer for the children

And you couldn’t always trust guests

But after the dishes were washed and put away

Sometimes Mama would lay her hands on the
Red-stained Wood once Green with life

And a lone tear would float, gentle, like Moses
Toward the palace

A dangerous act of Faith and a small step
Toward Freedom.