Destiny Starks

Wilted

Sometimes flowers wilt

They dry up and kiss their stems goodbye

Their stem, their support system, finally lets go of the broken dried petals and they fall

effortlessly to the ground...

Sometimes people can be flowers too

When I loved you, you made me a sunflower

A sunflower with healthy petals

And you, you were my stem, my support system...

Then you left...

How can a flower stand with no stem?

Is it still a flower? Just because it has petals?

How could a person stand with no limbs?

You forced me to stand with no legs

To exist with no arms

To be tall, with no stem...

I kissed you goodbye...

And I fell effortlessly to the ground...

Ghetto Flowers

Cut me some ghetto flowers.

The flowers that sprout over a black boys grave

The flowers that prove that something beautiful can grow from a story so dark

Cut me Trayvon Martin roses and Philando Castile daisies.

I want Eric garner tulips and Mike Brown dandelions.

I want Stephon Clark sunflowers and Emmett till carnations.

Cut me some ghetto flowers

The flowers that smell like grandma's kitchen on a Sunday

The flowers that scream “boy don’t wear your shoes in my house”

Flowers that grow until the street lights come on

Cut me the flowers that bloom in the neighborhood drug dealers yard

You know the flowers they be selling on the corner?

10 for a dime 25 for an eighth and 100 for a zip?

I want the blackest flowers you can find

Flowers that been through some shit

Bring me some ghetto flowers

I called us flowers because heat doesn’t burn us it helps us grow

The rain that pours doesn’t drown us, it’s the reason we bloom

and The wind that comes with it don’t do shit but show us what we can handle

So cut me some ghetto flowers

Cause they start movements

They start Martin Luther King Protest and Malcolm X Riots

They are the voices of a generation, of every generation

These flowers aren’t ghetto because they’ve been broken, they’re ghetto because they’re better than ever

You only see them as ghetto because you’ve never taken the chance to appreciate them

To hold them

To water them

To grow them

To show them it isn’t their fault that they grow this way

You put them in boxes and tried to slow their growth with things out of their control

Like Jim Crow

And Putting them on boats

Like detesting them because of how their petals grow

So bring me the blackest flowers you can find

Cause those flowers didn’t grow easy

Those flowers were planted with animosity and grew with eminence

Thank God for the flowers that prove that something beautiful can grow from a story so dark

From One Flower to Another (Inspired by Louise Gluck)

This is the earth? Then

I don’t belong here.

I am a flower that bloomed on the wrong side

of earth

Though I may be beautiful

My roots burn in this soil

My petals wilt in this air and

My stem holds a weight it cannot bear

Survival is more of a dream

Flowers that look like me can’t breathe

We can’t grow freely on any yard, lot or street

We can’t spread branches like the trees do

We don’t grow pretty petals or produce fruit

The environment here cannot sustain me

I know my silence is more pleasing to you than my screams

But

I wish to live, to grow as I please

I wish to be as free as the air that caresses my wilted petals

I wish to set this land ablaze and grow a field of flowers that grow like me

I want to be a flower so free

That the moon, the sun and trees feel envy

Gone will be the shackles of this soil

The shriveling of my petals will cease

And my stem will finally feel relief

I'll be at peace on this earth, that was never meant for me.

And I knew you once

Before... you were human

But now we’re trapped and our life source is a seed

And we’re nothing but flowers that wish to be as trees

Black Thoughts

America was cut from the skin of my ancestors

Their skin has been sewn, cut, stepped on, and burned

You’ll never understand my skin until you have it

So come take a step into my black

And try to tell me now...that America is great again

Tell the Trayvons, Sandras, Mikes and Emmetts

Black boy tears fill the water like Emmetts

Though he is not my kin, his pain is the same as my ancestors

Every time another Emmett is made, Black lives matter again

America isn’t in flames, it’s already burned

Step into my black

And feel this pain of being an “it”

I’ve always been an “it”

Sometimes I think of what would happen if I were like Emmett

This time it’s 2020, and it’s my black skin being beaten

It’s my tongue cut out, silenced like my ancestors

Then my skin will ignite with hell flames, and America will be burned

Now finally... my black life matters again

It’s happening again

Trayvon bled, Michael swung, and Addie Mae fried... they all felt it

Shot, Hung and Burned

Look! There goes another Emmett...

There goes my ancestors...

And it all fades to black

It always fades to black

Here comes death, knocking on our door again

But gone are my ancestors

There doorbell broke a long a time ago, Now they’re done with it

And Gone are the “Emmetts”

We’ll always remember how sweetly they burned

Skin Burned.

Black.

Cries of “Emmett’s”

Again... and Again

Will we ever be done with it?

I think so... for I am not my ancestors...

Emmett’s young soul burned with sorrow

The stories of my Ancestors are Black with pain

The story will happen again, It always does....

Meet My Anxiety

Meet my anxiety

She turns lakes into oceans

Fire into hell flames

My brain to a mess of assumptions and she drives me insane

She is the one who makes every situation bigger

She makes me bitter

I don’t think you’re cheating on me , she does

She makes me bitter

I don’t think you’re lying to me, she does

She makes me bitter

Meet my anxiety,

When you tell me that you love me, I believe it

But she always finds a way to deceive me

“I love you” fell on listening ears but it also fell on fear

It fell on thoughts of not being good enough

Your words fall on me and she screams her worries to my listening heart

Sometimes your words fall on me like snow , there so pretty but she makes them feel so cold

Meet my anxiety

Meet my panic attacks

Meet the reason my emotions are barely intact

Meet me and meet she

She that makes me forget I’m a person

I could be going through my day and suddenly my heart hurts

Suddenly my mouth doesn’t work

Suddenly my chest gets tight and my lungs forget how to

In...

Out...

In...

Out...

Breathe!

I’m begging her please just let me be

Just let me be in love

Just let me be me

Let me live free from you

Meet my anxiety.

The one that turns a mistake into a death sentence

A flower to a forest

Me into a mess

Tear after tear

Day after day

Meet my anxiety

And get used to her too

When you met me, you met she

And I hope you learn to love her like I’ve learned to love you