Brionne Janae
Against Mastery

give me no seat at the table

let no trembling hands lay food on my plate

 

let me lord over no one and nothing

not the dog curled up in my bed

 

not the land nor children who wander

through my care         let me learn from the babies

 

and be always laughing at my ignorance

only humble discovery       give me

 

and keep my eyes on the pattern of birds’ wings

breaking the blue overhead           let me face

 

the ones I harm with open palms and let love

be the method and measure of my worth

 

keep my heart with my people

and the coal glowing beneath my feet

 

let me run and run and run and run

and let the flame of my torch never go out

 

I am here with you

to burn the house down

 

keep me to this          cut me down

before you let me lose my way

 

Found In Volume 50, No. 06
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Brionne Janae
About the Author

 

Brionne Janae is the author of Because You Were Mine (2023), Blessed Are the Peacemakers (2022), which won the 2020 Cave Canem Northwestern University Press Poetry Prize, and After Jubilee (BOAAT Press, 2017).