Life in Print

Like ankle flesh torn from the burn of a rusty 

bilboe

I am born by blood and receipt.

Like the stream of fermented bile, snot, and 

urine

I am born by blood and receipt.

Like Kossola became Cudjoe and Ishtimonvbbi¹ became

Brown

I am born by blood and receipt.

Like rice water stains, hymen mucus, and 

mass production

I am born by blood and receipt.

Like Reconstruction, Black Codes, and 

Jim Crow

I am born by blood and receipt.

Like good hair and brown paper bag

tests

I am born by blood and receipt.

Like axe for ask, des for desk, and tes for

test

I am born by blood and receipt.

Like DNA results and unmatched speeding

tickets

I am born by blood and receipt.

Like sista, comadre, cuzzin, and 

mispronounced Asani-Yaphei

I am born by blood and receipt,

sanguine and fibrous yet only a few recognize, fewer acknowledge, and no one

apologizes.

White Winfreys interred in Tsalagi ground, 

flagged with an oxidized family crested lichgate,

and fifty miles away, their mulatto, Melungeon, mixed,

part this and part that progeny sleep together in a

pristine pasture on the side of a country road.

Still, born by blood and receipt.

© Asani Charles

1. Chikasha, “He killed the one who came for him.” ↩︎