We Want Our Bodies Back

Poems

Jessica Care Moore

• Publisher: Amistad
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9780062955289
• eBook ISBN:
  9780062955272
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: American Poetry
• Index: Literature

"WE WANT OUR BODIES BACK URGES BLACK WOMEN TO DEMAND BETTER FROM MEN." -ESSENCE

"MASTER POET JESSICA CARE MOORE GIFTS US THIS LATEST COLLECTION OF SHARP, SMART AND DEFIANT PIECES." -MS. MAGAZINE

BOOKS BY BLACK WOMEN WE CAN'T WAIT TO READ IN 2020 -REFINERY29

A dazzling full-length collection of verse from one of the leading poets of our time.
Over the past two decades, jessica Care moore has become a cultural force as a poet, performer, publisher, activist, and critic. Reflecting her transcendent electric voice, this searing poetry collection is filled with moving, original stanzas that speak to both Black women's creative and intellectual power, and express the pain, sadness, and anger of those who suffer constant scrutiny because of their gender and race. Fierce and passionate, Jessica Care moore argues that Black women spend their lives building a physical and emotional shelter to protect themselves from misogyny, criminalization, hatred, stereotypes, sexual assault, objectification, patriarchy, and death threats.

We Want Our Bodies Back is an exploration—and defiant stance against—these many attacks.

Part One

Wild Is the Wind

January 3, 1994

I wanted to see my daddy’s body

I wanted to see what they had done to him.

not the angels,

not God.

They didn’t take him. I was convinced.

He was thin and tall and southern sophisticated

kool milds and southern comfort next to his bed

smile that could capture the attention of women

half his age.

I laid down in his twin bed the morning he died.

I wanted to find the grooves of his body inside

the fabric so i could bury myself inside of what

he left behind.

A part of my body

would always be dead after this day

I examined the house that was never my house

I searched for clues. I rolled my eyes at the strange

man who was walking around. I didn’t trust him, or

his smell or his eyes. I didn’t trust the woman

who was my daddy’s young girlfriend at the time

of his death.

I didn’t trust many women

after my daddy’s body left Detroit.

I wanted to see him.

Why can’t we see him?

Henry Ford Hospital had his body somewhere.

I forever hate hospitals.

The doctor told my brother Jonny it would be

better to

just wait until he was prepared for the

funeral.

We left my daddy’s body with these strangers

My brother didn’t notice, but i was screaming

no one noticed, but i

was flying

I was kicking the doctor in the gut and running

Down the white doorways to find my daddy’s body

So i could bring him back

home with me.

Mother Earth Prayer

You may want to reconsider only praying

to your father for mankind

God.

Considering the vulnerable state of humanity,

you may want

to call

your momma.

She Was.

I have convinced myself

I speak french

Somehow I will find a way to make

a Perfect sound

An: un/english

I don’t know

What else to do

With this language cept

Murder it.

Dig out its eyes. Every vowel. Till it suffocates

Choke the breath out of this alphabet

I need more than 26 letters to articulate

How I survived you.

How we survived

calculated attempts to blow

the heads off our sons

Slavery in a digital world

I have buried all the men i loved and will

Ever love

Before you could

get to them

Now what, mutha fucka

I won’t allow y...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Contents
• Introduction
• Part One: Wild Is the Wind
• Part Two: I Put a Spell on You
• Part Three: I Got Life
• Part Four: Black Is the Color of My True Love’s Hair
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Also by jessica Care moore
• Copyright
• About the Publisher