Praise Song for My Mother
Praise Song for My Mother
You were
water to me
deep and bold and fathoming
You were
moon’s eye to me
pull and grained and mantling
You were
sunrise to me
rise and warm and streaming
You were
the fish’s red gill to me
the flame tree’s spread to me
the crab’s leg/the fried plantain smell replenishing replenishing
Go to your wide futures, you said
Copyright: from The Fat Black Woman’s Poems (Virago, 1984) © Grace Nichols 1984, used by permission of the author c/o Curtis Brown literary agency.