BY LaVana Colebrooke
“Do you still do that?” he asked me
and his eye turned down
and his face turned in.
And I felt all my internal shift begin.
GUILT
Feeling caught by the net of friendship and rope burned by the bondage's of emotional relationships.
NERVOUS
I’m not completely sure of this process of processing the fact that my internal processors progressively lack progress.
CONFUSED
Am I not supposed to be eating meat? Is it bad for me
-in particular me that is an educated, life bearing and giving, loved filled person of womanly color-
to eat meat, like is this not SUPPOSED to be a choice for me because of the me that you make into me?
DENIAL
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no and no, defiantly not and no no no no.
ACCEPTANCE
There is nothing inherently wrong with being wrong about what’s taught to be right.
-even though-
It’s considered systematically wrong what is my rights.
But
WAIT
STOP
Wait and stop this internal unproductive panic.
It’s damaging and deadly.
It’s seriously senseless.
There’s no rhyme to reason and no reason to rhyme it.
SILENCE
“Do you still do that?” he asked me. “Not eating meat?”
and I realize with a pause
and I realize with a breath
and I felt all my insides to realize the answers living there from the moment of my first life giving thought.
YES
I said. “Yes, I still don’t do that.”
More of LaVana’s work is available for download as part of our Full of Holes poetry collection.
