This is the difficult miracle of Black poetry in America: that we persist, published or not, and loved or unloved: we persist. - June Jordan

Oh! If you would only walk
into this room
again and touch me anywhere
I swear
I would not long for heaven or
for earth
more than I'd wish to stay there
touched
and touching you

I believe that suffering does not confer virtue upon the victim. Hence it is possible that the slave will become the slaveholder and that the victim will become the executioner.

the motivation behind every sentence is the wish to say something real to somebody real.