a note on the body
your body still your body
your arms still wing
your mouth still a gun
you tragic, misfiring bird
you have all you need to be a hero
don’t save the world, save yourself
you worship too much & you worship too much
when prayer don’t work: dance, fly, fire
this is your hardest scene
when you think the whole sad thing might end
but you live oh, you live
everyday you wake you raise the dead
everything you do is a miracle
Danez Smith, “a note on the body” from Don’t Call Us Dead. Copyright © 2020 by Danez
Smith. Used with the permission of The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of Graywolf Press,
Minneapolis, Minnesota, graywolfpress.org.
This poem was originally read in the This Movie Change Me episode Danez Smith — The Color Purple.
Reflections