A Poem From The Year

“for deLawd” by Lucille Clifton:

people say they have a hard time

understanding how i

go on about my business

playing my ray charles

hollering at the kids—

seem like my afro

cut off in some old image

would show I got a long memory

and I come from a line

of black and going on women

who got used to making it through murdered sons

and who grief kept on pushing

who fried chicken

ironed

swept off the back steps

who grief kept

for their still alive sons

for their sons coming

for their sons gone

just pushing

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(From The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton 1965-2010, edited by Kevin Young and Michael S. Glasner with a foreward by Toni Morrison © 2012 by The Estate of Lucille Clifton. Used by permission of BOA Editions, Ltd. Photo by Flickr user Greg)