Nobody Knows Culture
Use your ears
Hear the rhythm of my cultural drums? The ancestors thumbs Picking Pumping Plaiting
On the flesh of my ears
Say my name
Did your fingers close the book? You merely skimmed the surface Desperately Dropping Dragging
On the flow of my name
Fly with your wings Superhero
The maps that carried you here
The mind that makes you stare Takeoff Land Of foreigners Strange, to you. .
LS © 3
Dress up
Ben up
Like the words you contort into promises.
Your idea of change is one that fits into pockets.
Mine cannot be contained.
4 LS ©
Politricked
When We Walked
What if when we walked, our feet sounded like an applause the sound of a symphony fading out softly bowing out gracefully this resistance is a melody what would happen if we walked
5 LS ©
The people gave into quiet submission
While governments waged wars on occupied lands
As urgent social media hashtags and posts fed a hungry algorithm
Podcasts for men, by men Sprinkle sprinkle.
Nil, we lost our need to communicate
The War, one.
Clout currency replaced survival by food and community
For #visibility
6 LS ©
Invisible
My Armour
To the left to the right, guys drop like flies
I never was a girl that loved to build ties
Except in the morning when I had to for school
Even then I was a girl that still broke the rules
Ultimately, my uniform was my armour
The rolls of my skirt bundled under my jumper protected me
The holy rips in my tights gathered an assembly
My open collar preached a message unruly
My uniform was my armour
My plimsolls grounded me
PE was the joy of my teens
Nevermind the fact that I cried when I outgrew my gum-shields
My smile was pink, fluorescent and fulfilled
My uniform was my armour
In a world that waged so much misery
My uniform shielded and created memories
The stripes of white and purple
Then gold and green
Then a sudden shift
Expelled at 14
Those uniforms could no longer be my armour
So at 15 I bought my first leggings
Matched by short black crop tops
Sported in clubs that knew not my real age
This new uniform was my armour
Away from constricting blazers
And that judgemental gaze
This new uniform was my armour
At 16 I wore burgundy for a year straight
Bold, fearless, I had to create
A new kind of armour
My armour over the years has seen much decoration
Hours of contemplation
Newness and transformation
Its a language I use when I can’t speak
It addresses the masses before my feet reach
My uniform is my armour.
7 LS ©
Doctor Who
When I think I need a holiday
I might need a poem instead
For words to translate
The urge of escape
In my head
Moments of the present
Suffocate a disjointed history
As a braid emerges from weave
One lives a mystery
In life
You can run.
Sometimes, far enough to become
A champion and celebrate material wealth
No reward to pause for your mental health.
Are you checking in to the right places
Or simply checking in?
8 LS ©
I've been to heaven
My stomach was tight
Fearing the experience
That transformed partial light Into a rainbow
That stood bold
At the neck of the mountain
What is heaven without people?
A place that exceeds
The populous noise of greed And countless ego’s rushing
A home where souls hold peace.
Where do our souls meet in heaven?
The mirror I suppose Stillness is a reflection of other kindred souls meeting underneath a crystal the eye of God
Our hearts entangled in a safe warm flood
How do you fear heaven?
She radiates ahead far beyond a temporary path of terror and dread.
9 LS ©
Heaven
Oceans of Molasses
The mouth of the ocean swallowed you
The ocean that once gave birth
To unending dreams
And possibilities that connected galaxies of gold
To the end of your plaits
Thunder was your thoughts
The core trembled when you spoke
To a knowing that danced around your halo
For you knew of supremacy
Located in pockets of time we cannot measure
And the sum of love plus a gentle smile
Was a feeling that lasts forever
When the oceans dried and exposed the cancerous grit
Forming in the crevice of your feet
You smiled because your head was above water
All this time you were never of the water
Though you were charmed
By the readiness of a body that Wild wide and wicked
Oh son of the sun!
The effervescent beam
Of the evening
Precisely moves with your stride
And don’t they all lust after molasses
For its entangling addiction?
Your history as the original source
And an essence so Black.
You knew the currents of the ocean
And saw excitement
That washed away sooner
Than the trickster wave
Appearing every now and again
Yes,
You saw
But you were tormented
By the distance the waters created, by which you were separated
I know, that's what they saw.
10 LS ©
LS ©
You, her, me
Look towards life with dreams but without honour
Life is disposable - my life even morebecause of the crest between my legs?
The curve of joy on my chest.
Waves of life that surround my smile
A reminder of never owning yours
The blindness to your own shine
Why are you so threatened by me?
Numb and tired from the constant cycle
Overworking till nothing really works without me
In this legacy of your slavery
Maybe that’s still the problem
The way you see me.
But that’s not the same as knowing me -
If you knew
You’d know my confidence isn't just found in me
Its around me
in the women that look like me
Maybe the problem
Is that my freedom is our agency
African women gather at front
At the backend of the violence
Groans and heart slashes,
From the many times violence came Stayed and slept, on wi
If you wondered
This is the legacy of slavery
11
lavinyastennett.co.uk @gottabelavin ya LS ©
