Daughter of the Night – for Shukri Abidi

I see you still

eyes closed

I hear your silence
louder than my screams
before the wave’s final claim

Where I come from, when elders sang songs to us at night, they told us we were daughters of the night, it was always deep, dark moonless night our bodies deep dark moonless our faces deep dark moonless

From night’s womb I came
brief day
you threw me back in its jaw
deep dark sunless the waters deep dark sunless the waves

before the passing

so deep

Daughter of the Night – for Shukri Abidi

before the silence

unending

the gasps

so brief

the breath

The waters were only another kind of night

just stranger

The weight of the world was too much upon me those days
the weight of your hate

too much

My life was a passing from night to night