in parentheses

Eboni Sade’ is a Jersey City, NJ native with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications from Howard University. She has been published in This Old House Magazine, St. Maarten’s Guide to Writing Handbook, The Amistad Journal, ImageOutWrite and Blackberry: a magazine. She is also the author of Skin to Skin.

New Jerusalem Rising

Mercury Rising
Asphalt Settling

B R E A T H E
Soul Sista
You’ve penned
Eloquent Testaments
Coloratura Genius
For us to digest
For an eternity
Dreadlocks woven in Jah’s hands and infinite sapphire
Transitioned into a cropped mane following
Assata Shakur’s handbook on How-To-Build-A-Dope-Fro
We heard you
Rightfully so
Rightly-fist chanting
Of Sisterhood treasures
Revolutionary causes encased in ankhs and tyet symbols

Mercury Rising
Asphalt Settling

But your microphone was low-pitched
When the second album came out
The unconventional
Unsafe
Truth-slaying
Emotionally charged material
Didn’t mirror
The highly acclaimed classic of prior
We heard you
Skinfolk bellied those hymns
From the New Testament
Spirits aligned
In kindred souls

Mercury Rising
Asphalt Settling

But the limelight dimmed
Accusations hung on the pulse of actualities
Met with
Venom in humor’s clothing
By the media
But
We still saw you
We still see you
Each time they place your head on the guillotine
And your body on the auction block
We simply
Ease the angled blade from above your head
And wrap our arms around your body
And say
Soul Sista
We remember
Who you are

Mercury Rising
Asphalt Settling

B R E A T H E
Soul Sista
Voice sang sweetly
As if marmalade trickled down your throat
And coated its’ interior
Many of us
Were born there
Digested carefully
And transcended through your mouth
In perfect pitch
Octaves that reached
Heavenly tiers
Unmatched by any mere mortal 

Mercury Rising
Asphalt Settling

Undisputed two-stepping
Quick feet-shuffling champion
Teeth molded in diamond
And set to cool in the bosom of Cleopatra
We saw you
And practiced in the mirror
With bristled hairbrushes
And imagined Costner
Intercepting metal intended for us

Mercury Rising
Asphalt Settling

And watched
As the media
Slit your throat
In front of your own
Mother and daughter
Dimming down a legacy
Tying it with a pretty bow
Of slanderous words and stew of ill will
We understood you
You did not drown
An abuser
You were christened
In that bathtub of cooling water
As your soul
Took flight
For an intellectually intimate
Soirée with Christ 

Mercury Rising
Asphalt Settling

We called you Whitney.
We call you Lauryn.
Mercury
Asphalt
Rising
Settling