6:00 PM Khaliifah Williams

by Atarah Israel

After 1108 Troy Davis

i hope his travel is light as a feather

as light as his soul is

may his bones become one 

with the same earth that 

will consume the greedy when 

their time comes/his body be 

a resting place for its gentle 

creatures/until then/i hope 

angels lay his burdens upon 

the shoulders of all those 

complicit in his murder/god/

his murder/i pray the tears of 

his loved ones nourish the 

ground/i hope flowers grow 

in the wake of its water/its 

salt find its way into the eyes 

of amerika’s crooning gawk/i 

watched flowers bloom across my 

brother’s face when his friend was 

shot/i heard their petals cry too/i 

dreamed him limbless tree/wished 

for flight-full fowls that howl 

against wind to find him/hum him hymns 

of sweet rain and fields of melody

hope their voices curdle against/

his sharp edges/billow songs of strange 

fruit/as its stench hangs in the breeze/

i know about the petals black boys

shed before they’re ready to blossom/

Khaliifah got his flowers from us far too late.