Janisse Ray
Justice
Let them have their oil.
Let them have their mosques and holy books,
the sun gleaming on the face of a woman
kneeling for the fifth time to pray.
Let her have the baby in her arms.
Let her bring from market the lentils, lamb,
bouquet of cilantro, cloves
that taste like the dusty rock of house
walls bordering the street.
Let her have the woven rug red and blue
beneath her real feet.
Let her have the pot, and the wooden ladle,
and the quiet ticking of a clock she no longer notices.
Let her have the common bird singing from the olive
and the sound of a door opening as it should.
And let me have my farm.
Let me have small clouds of breath as I rise
from patchwork quilts in the winter house.
Let me have a fallen maple for firewood
and the fire itself an eager bed of coals.
Let me have bowls of oatmeal and cups of tea
sweetened with tupelo honey, steaming
on the white enamel table.
Let me have my husband pulling on boots
to plant potatoes, while the moon
pauses in the sign for roots.
Let me have brown eggs still warm
from the hen, milk hot from the cow.
Let me have the common bird singing from the oak
and the sound of a door opening as it should.
Janisse Ray, A House of Branches, Wind Publications, 2010.