Tag Archives: Female Poets

A yellow woman approached me

Slanted were her eyes

And asked why she had never seen a black woman cry.

I could answer not her question

And was taken quite aback

Does not every woman cry no matter yellow white or black?

We absolutely do cry.

What else consoles our pain?

We pray for our oppressors and then we cry to calm our shame.

A black woman’s tears are sacred.

They cleanse her as she weeps

But sorrow sends to soil her soul and steadily it creeps.

She cries when she’s with wisdom

There’s none left to do but cry

Her lament surrendered honest, it needs not an alibi.

After pondering the ponder

I believe I’ve found reply

I know why it is you’ve never seen a black woman cry.

Seldom are her whispers heard

Far too often she’s invisible

The world around her seems to think that she’s somehow invincible.

She runs nowhere when she’s wounded

Pain enough to want to die

Silently she suffers as she finds the will to try.

Perhaps you’ve never noticed

Truly coming eye to eye

Maybe that is why you’ve never seen a black woman cry

She cries because she knows

People think she doesn’t cry

And she doesn’t need

or feel

or think

or know

or want

or die.

~Rachelle M. Turple