my grandmova old map i’m working on / dream-composition
by SOLOMON BROOKS
in Fall 2024
Trey Campbell, from Room Service, 2024
my grandmova old map i’m working on
my armor lives
full n untouch’d,
felt between us
my armor is compounded from
th gnashing of teef,
darting of eyes,
th stomping of feet
n fountainheads
spilling memories yet unthought
n already forgot,
whisprd loudly on chunky margins
my armor (is) was (will be donned for me
a thousan’ mouths in the breastplate
speechless,
kissan’ my head,
talkan’ shit,
singan’ soul,
some teef golden,
sayin’ a thousan’ wrds
words i do not kno, but kno they tru
i knw cus they come frm
my armor
is (was being) made frm earf n blood, bodies twisted, eyes the witness
two thousan’ eyes in my helmet
watchan’ out for me,
plannan’,
i know what those eyes see(n n will
they (will) see(n the two thousan’ feet in
my armor, has tew thousan’ legs inna greaves
dansan’ on some beats,
walking wit a perpose,
to a day where
my armor is love
dream-composition
i went out in the night with tyrant nothings
and we made church sounds
raucous tambourines flooded the streets
we went and made our noise
and it was dense
we pulled apart gates and used the wire
to make koras and hula hoops
we played and danced
we raised the dead
and strangely through all the noise we made,
no one dreaming they were alive awoke
and with daybreak, we fell where we were, asleep
we dreamed we was Americans that morning
Solomon Brooks is a recent graduate of Howard University. He is a writer whose interests lie in the admixture of Africana Epistemologies, Black Political Theory, Intellectual Histories, Musico-Cultural pathways, and Black literature & aesthetics.
