I'LL BRUSH YOUR HAIR, PUT YOUR DU-RAG ON Poem by Danez Smith

I'll be your wife tonight

long as mice are the only witnesses

long as we don't use real names

meet me behind the church, I'll be wearing the white of your eyes

for our honeymoon, let's burn the place down



sweetheart, in a dream

you told me if I turned my back

to the sunrise, I could watch shadows learn to stand



oh my blue little something, my borrowed boy



I woke up & you were gone

back to the bed you bought her

I find it more respectable to think myself a widow



here in the shallow blue of morning

unimpressed by the sun

blackness has escaped me again



I begged the dark to stay

I called it your name



(silly me, never asked) or

(silly me, don't kiss & tell) or

(silly me, don't ask don't tell) or

(silly boy, tell a soul & I'll kill you)