and remind you

yetunde returns to touch the cheek of her great great granddaughter

i will need the power in my legs

when i return to earth

i will smile and remember

i am free

when i return to earth

i will see the love i made

unshackled

and remind you

i will see the love i made

from the inside out

i will remind you who you are

i will be the best love possible

from the inside out

i will grow this life

i will be the best love possible

i made it

i will grow this life

i will smile and remember

i made it

with these free fat legs and fists

(This poem is in the voice of my Nana’s great great grandmother. We don’t know her name. Yetunde means “ancestor returned” in Yoruba. So this poem is about what that ancestor, who lived in Jamaica at the time of enslavement would say to her great great grandchild (my Nana) if she came back in the form of a grandchild (me!) The multiple directions of mothering, the embodied memories of freedom, the reflection and the time travel. All of it. This is how we reach each other across seven generations and answer for the world we have left, the world we have made. Remember how free you are.)