Flat-Footed Truths by Patricia Bell-Scott

Author:Patricia Bell-Scott
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.

LEGACY/REPEAT AFTER ME

akasha (gloria) hull

My great-grandmother

compacted all her grief

until it festered as a life sore

in her side

She huddled it close

changed her pus-stained rags

in secret

Nobody in the family

knew about her shame

until they smelled the cancer

which ate her breath away

My grandmother

never found her proper nourishment

They said she ate “too much cornmeal”

Pellagra, we call it today—

a deficiency disease

which killed my grandmother

little, quick woman

who never stopped moving

until she died

My mother lives out

their lives of lack and limitation

old pains, old wounds, old angers,

resentment, grief, fear, and shame

Her milk soured in the mouth

of my baby brother

Thirty-eight years later

they cut the whole breast off

Lack of self-love, love—criticism

hardening her joints

she still holds on

holds on

All this they willed to me

this freighted legacy

I want

to cast away

I say—to myself—

repeat after me:

Throw out those old clothes

(Let the latest and hottest fashions take their place)

Give the leftover spoonsful to the dog

(God will set a fresh dish on the table)

Do not hoard pieces of string, clean rags,

or colored ribbons

(Say: What I need will be at hand when I need it)

Give up extreme gratefulness for pennies

(so that thanks for thousands can be made)

Give away love

(then love, and then more love will fill the place)

Let go fear

(Come power and possibility)

Expel anger

(Welcome joy)

Let go of children

(who will then embrace you happily at every turn)

Release pain and dis-ease

(Spirit pushes the healing through)

And now

I say:

repeat after me

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