STATIONS

Some women love

to wait

for life for a ring

in the June light for a touch

of the sun to heal them for another

woman’s voice to make them whole

to untie their hands

put words in their mouths

form to their passages sound

to their screams for some other sleeper

to remember their future their past.

Some women wait for the right

train in the wrong station

in the alleys of morning

for the noon to holler

the night come down.

Some women wait for love

to rise up

the child of their promise

to gather from earth

what they do not plant

to claim pain for labor

to become

the tip of an arrow to aim

at the heart of now

but it never stays.


Some women wait for visions

that do not return

where they were not welcome

naked

for invitations to places

they always wanted

to visit

to be repeated.

Some women wait for themselves

around the next corner

and call the empty spot peace

but the opposite of living

is only not living

and the stars do not care.

Some women wait for something

to change and nothing

does change

so they change

themselves.

by Audre Lorde