Welcome To De Sarcophagus Ah Patriarkey
Content Warning: Physical & Verbal Violence Against Queeribbean People
De day afta de Red Muddah shut-up shap
Darkness de covah de rims ah Guyana
Castin de plague ah shadows
Into de souls ah de eye-suh-late.
An still, de faddah, muddah,
An de oly spirit ah Patriarchiee
De baptize rivahs ah agony fah
Wash way de queerness outta dey son
Sinful body wid de oly scriptshas.
Buh wah shame you gat
Tah get fah drain meh soul
Suh you could guh home?
Victimae paschal laudes
To the paschal victim
Behine de dense bush ah Hudo Backdam
An de tick muda wata, feel de sway
Ah banana breeze. Watch de kaleidoscope
Ah light hoist de broken child into paradise.
Save by de colony ah Priests,
De chile is lain ta rest.
Kill fah de parents salvashion.
Ear dem
Immobent Christian
Let Christians offer up their songs of praise
Buh, how we gon get inta Heaven
Wen de seed dat is sown is kourpt wid sorrow?
Ta enter intah Paradise
Yah gat to exorcise de demon in de host,
The sins of the flesh must perish
Before resurrecting eternal salvation,
Aguns redemit oves
The lamb has redeemed the sheep.
As day melt into nite,
Dem start fah see
De krakz ah reality.
Ten days afta de lackdown,
Fahdah de kyan look at meh,
Clean, too neat fah dem lackdown.
Stink wid ee brown rum,
Ee de kyan tek am no mo.
Is wah kine a man, me raise ah wah?
*SMACK, SMACK*
Brown skin bleed, bleedin again.
Bruk-up pieces ah de green rum bahckle
Dey “deep-deep” in de picknee head.
Red streaks ah blood trickle inta de land
“Twist an twist am, till he learn.”
“I AM A BOY”
LOUDDAH, YAH LIL FAGGOT SHIT,
“TWIST AN TWIST DE BAHCKLE IN EE EAD”
De pickniee hollah-hollah, buh like wan gal
“Twist again”, Mona come old down yah Son
Ee nah learn.
“I,” from de core ah ee
Masculinity, de chile
Profess, “AM A MAN.”
Good, yah lil shit,buh
“Hallah, hallah sum mo”
Christus innices patri
Christ, who is without sin
Crowned wid de halo ah
Green glass, Ah learn meh lesson:
Lil bahnaz dem nah neat,
Stay stink an outa faddah gaze.
Reconcilivait peccatores
He has reconciled sinners to the Father
Call yah wah? Jas-mine?
MONA!! Come hay, gurl!!
WE NAME YAH JAZZ CAUZE YOU IZ AH BAI
“NO, I am nat.”
“OH REALLY?
Whip-whip de telephone wire into ee back”
MONA-MONA, dis is wrang
*Smack-Smack*
“Teach ee fah be wan real-real man”
Ee wan change ee name to wan gal now.
Yuh iz me son
“Kick an stamp, stamp an kick”
Yuh iz a bai,
Nah WAN GAL.
Mors et vita duello
Death and Life
“Tie ee down to de coconut tree.
Dose ee wid kryo fah we eat,
Baptize ee foot wid Oly Fire,
Bun de devil outa de bai.
Bun ta wan redden crisp
Mould de chile ta wah will now.”
Bath meh badie in Oly Fire
Fah save meh muddah?
Does it please yah fahddah?
Is it safe fah me now?
Dux vitae mortous
The Prince of life was dead
Regnant vivus
But lives and reigns
Tah save yah soul,
Yuh muss dead.
Poison wid de apple ah sin.
Chritius spesmea
Truly, we, know Christ
Tu nobis victor rex misereie
O King and victor have mercy on us
Buh Mercy, ee
Nah live hay,
Dey is only Death.
Amen, Alleluia
On the happiest day of my survival,
I shall break fast with death’s diener.
You know, he who removes the solidified mass
Of your living dead remains.
These attendants are adorned in a long white coat,
It is dyed with a brown water stain
At the back of the unusually white pristine coat.
On their feet, a pair of black,
Knee-length glossy boots squish-squish
As my chariot into the afterlife awaits.
The trolley is extensive in length,
Browning rust eats the sliver bones of its legs.
Do you hear the whistle of a dying vessel?
It groans in protest as its arthritis joints
Are pushed to the limit. It too cries in mortification
Of my departure from the Red Muddah land.
A soul never lived but destined to die
Shall return to our Father’s Kingdom.
I eagerly watch as my purple botched body is charioted away,
A sad song is sung as another soldier is fallen,
A child of queer descent, afraid to be,
So she remains untold, another face removed
From the soul cold graveyard of the undead.
My heart weeps rivers of epinephrine,
It marches in my veins, galloping its feet,
Pounding in the broken cage of my stolen heart,
One thought ghosts its way across my mind:
Is it safe to be real now?
From the very scent of Mothers’s floral fumes,
Or Father’s stink brown rum violence,
It invades the crevices of my youth.
They raped the beauty of my identity in the creation
Of a daughter that was never meant to be,
For I am a girl
Forever trapped in a boy's body.
As Death’s orderly gently lays
My warm body on the cool slab table
Of my own confession, the cause of death is natural.
So the plethora of purple trophies
That married my body is often overlooked,
After all, there is no mercy for the transgenered soul.
In the name of the Father,
The Son, and the Holy Spirit:
Forgive me, Father, for I’ve sinned…
Do you remember, Mother,
The purple ribbon that Father awarded me?
Your prayers to exorcise the gayness,
My transgenderness out of my desired soul?
So you sold my masculinity away
In your determination to cleanse
My sins away, or else I shall burn in hell
Forevermore.
Do you remember, Mother,
The purple cloak they tied around
My limbs as they crucified my body
To satisfy your honesty to be the ideal holy family?
From the purple cross of my suffering,
I am made anew.
Be safe now, Mother, Father.