I try hard to remove the mask.

This feeling feels heavy like a coat.

Lined on the inside of this coat are the demands

shoulda-coulda ain't got no choice but too.

My shoulder pads are the burdens

placed there long before I arrived:

No one saw
the moment it ended.

There was no fight,
no final words.

I’ve always been weary

of people who are more concerned

with my expression of pain

Than what caused it in the first place.

I will protect you

I wanna protect what’s mine 

I wanna protect because I wasn’t 

Protected 

Breeze flows through my hair. The clouds are big and puffy.

Podcasts hum in the background and children play outside.

I drift higher and higher as the cool air touches me reaching towards the sky.

A bird passes me and I realize I am flying.

Interview with Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie.

Happy Halloween! To end this month’s theme of Transformation, we present to you three poems from an accomplished and talented poet, Safia Jama.

Poetry from Jamica A. Whitaker

Poetry from Maggie Smith

Poetry from Zahura Akter

All the weight of the world is placed upon you as a Black woman.

Especially if you are a Black woman that is well aware of the intricacies of social inequalities.

Is there such a thing as a Black woman that could truly say she isn’t anymore?

Crown your glory

Honey and melanin

This golden tone is your identity

To unify within the gentrified community

I will not be your puppet in a minstrel show

Because I guarantee no Mammy, Jezebel, or Sambo lives here

You may try to control my thoughts and dreams

But I will not be your Venus Hottentot

Poem from SBG Poetry editor Sherese Francis