the gospel of mommy’s daughter

know what the undone headscarf knows                    that heaven is a chop bar in ghana where

high life can be purchased for 3 ghana cedi               that lwil palma kristi can feed scalp, soothe

womb, uncrack heel, cure cold, survive apocalypse              amongst men, women are full gods

papaya is often frozen to provide the allusion that momma cuts it each night to make a

juice, that’s really a smoothie, that’s unfilled with papaya’s original nutrients                      at

birth, the head is tender, then we become hard headed, then we sing in the shower because the

washing reminds us of grandma and her full body cleanses                   lemonade hurts the men that

hurt the women that hurt themselves for loving men who love themselves and hate the women

who loved him when he hated saying she was worth something at all                      niggas be

niggin and nigged all over the carpet and the toilet seat and the good sheets and niggad their way

through your blessings and your savings and your wastes and dried mangoes and ripe messes and

your sanity                  among women women lie, but for good things like getting into heaven and

being modest and pleasing gods and seeing each other as gods and karma and singing at each

other’s wedding                     a woman who keeps her name after marriage is always fighting

good sex in headwraps brings good fortune to bed frames              sugar cane is both a

sweetener and biting toy                     locs smell like coconut and castor oil                         in a

perfect world, women would carry the child, and men would carry the pain              in the  palm of

her hands is a star she ripped from the sky and keeps at her bedside                        the roots of earth are

burning and she can’t stop

---

nine ways to skin a good girl

 

open mouth in a public restroom after lying

face first in a pool of the body’s fresh vomit

 

make a promise and break it against her back

like you would if you wanted old goat meat to be tender

 

spoon a quarter ounce of cooking oil down

her mourning throat and call it hymnals

 

tell her she is made of sugar and man

and her body is hers on loan until needed

 

tell her mother her pussy is being auctioned and promising

buyers want proof that her protest won’t come attached

 

tell her body that it gets what it gets and it has what it has

till a man grandfathered thought otherwise

 

make her pay for the wall around her uterus

that will keep her from inviting the shit men in

 

name her bitch and smack her hands away from her smile

when she learns to unlearn the game

 

skin a cat and pin the flesh to a clothes line

and show her she is of the dead things

 

wash, rinse, repeat

---

often used to describe invisible

 

of course i exist

of course i resurrected from spit fire imprints against my thighs

of course i rise

and plummet

and phoenix

of course i synch up to moon phases, hieroglyphs, and dust

of course i undone

of course i sex self selfishly in a mirror while braiding

and mudbound

and praying

of course i conjure

of course i goliath in this bitch and make scary things quiet

of course i punish

 

and men dim light to me

speak what’s right there into nonsense too drying for consumption

men lost body and asked me to help get it back

called my body collect and made me promise to give it back

ain’t it illegal or some shit to own the rights to undead bodies?

or is that only in a just world

or in a mass grave where no one wants ownership of a mud burnt not-person

 

—

 

is your body a verb?

does it smell like sex?

are you hiding your sexy from me?

did you want it even as you screamed?

do you still want it even as you scream?

are there doors that a nigga really can’t open?

are there even supposed to be closed doors here?

this is my house. this is my body. open up

---

lleh nacirema: the aftershock

 

good girl wore stripes across her chest and played ping pong in a quiet hotel rec room::good girl colored in between the lines— cleaned dirty dishes before supper to avoid bugs::bed bugs attach themselves to bags, the pillows, the hem of a shirt bought at swap shop for easter, the jackets, the covers, the bed frame::fucking bugs travelling the history of foot, to thigh, to wasteland, to breast, to brain cells self-harmed::mud girls draw roses into scrapbooks as busy work for pretty girls to be honored as valentines::fuck lemon drops and the boys who stole them when good girls had the juice::dogs cower to the other side of the street when good girl walks through::men pray up to see what good girl can really do::their fingers point at good girl and make naked her scars—

 

mud girl be niggin—

earthquaked body out of ship

and refused the wreck

 

mud girl is of rain::mouth loud and filling and ugly and made of sugar cane and scotch bonnet and wet cement::mud girl be basemented in your lleh nacirema, be based on the momma who fed chillen that unclothed her when she body was of no use— be meant to say something sugared that sour in a tempered tongue::temples of the mind are meant to center the body in the absence of worth, yet mud girl’s is becoming her cage::birds don’t fucking sing in cages for pleasure, but for protest::principle pleasure points in mud girl’s body is her tongue, the nape of her neck, and a blemish against her thigh::binge drinking while staring at cat vomit on an apartment wall was the undoing of mudgirl— of her hair, the cower of death entering without first knock::mud girl is poison, or poisoned, or poisoning— mommas wounds at her wrist some centuries later—

 

good girl hides the mud—

peppered tongue licks moon bone dry

as parasites breed

---

psalms: as told by jezabèl

 

pray on your knees so she can hear you

hear your name in his mouth while on knees giving praise

praise her name in the last pew during early morning worship

#pussyworship on his mother’s good sheets during riot

bring sheet music to harmonize during choir practice

choir chants toot it and boot it coming from the revival

hold a revival of faith so the lost can return home

return favors on snapchat and turn sex into poems

sinners sex before vows and repent at childbirth

mothers raise a good girl quietly but all men see is invite

see the holy in your big thighs and big hips and big eyes

big lips sell on backpage for big nickel and his wise

men wisen when worshipping god in her woman shape

for every shaped woman in lleh nacirema six must be tamed

bless the alter woman who has carried her sin to it’s grave

carry the woman to a grave that is unbefitting of her sin

fit your blessings into a napkin to be praised loud

praise the quiet when he gave your blessings no room to resound

---

Daschielle Louis is a Haitian American poet, writer, and graphic artist from South Florida: her work exists at the intersections of blackness, womanhood, and migration. Daschielle’s poetry and short stories have appeared in spaces such as Token Magazine, Rise Up Review, Linden Avenue Literary Journal, and Panku Literary and Arts Magazine. Her literary and design work is housed on her website, daschielle.ink.