I was born
with a Southern drawl
flowing from my lips
like rich red clay
during a summer downpour,
thick and shifting
with each emotion,
an open window to my heart’s hue,
with no mistaking the color of it’s source,
at once velvet liquid slip
flowing with a languid ease
in welcoming rivulets
then
the cracked ground
of a scorching summer afternoon
where you’d best watch your step
or risk tripping yourself up,
But the man on the t.v.,
he told me in no uncertain terms,
that the soil in my voice
coated me in ignorance and shame,
that I should wash myself clean.
He taught me
with his strict diction
and firm suggestions
of which of his products
could save me from myself
And good and diligent pupil that I was,
I learned.
Pulling my bare feet from the fertile mud
and rinsing away my ancestors,
I walked away.
Decades have passed
and my tongue grows thirsty so far from home,
yearning for the taste of red clay
during a summer rainstorm.
(J. McCray)
The Sterling Line 