THE FOREST THAT WEAVES OUR NAMES

The trees here grow in reverse—
roots braiding skyward,
leaves plunging
where the earth’s heartbeat
thumps like muffled drums.
We enter with a palmful of grandmother’s ashes
The last verse of a hymn cut short
That metallic taste
when the rain smells like blood
The river speaks in tongues
At dawn, it whispers in Gullah
By noon, it argues in Creole
Come dusk, it sings
the half-finished lullabies
of drowned railroad men
We pay our passage with
A lock of hair
Three tears (one sweet, one salt, one rust)
The thicket spits back
A baby shoe filled with honeybees
The middle name you forgot you had
The blueprint for building
a freedom ship
from broken rocking chairs
Now we harvest
Thunderstorms from magnolia blossoms
Forgiveness from fireweed
The soil remembers what we bury
Gold teeth
Jury summons