(After Pepper LaBeija)
He would always say the children would not know a look if they saw one.
How sickening a sight a shimmering thing, all glowing darkness.
We could never capture his illusion here, why deny a nigga his
when he has given us all of ours. He dreamed of speaking over shoulder
& white leather couches with his lineage around him. All the children exhaling, some for the first time, at his feet. He dreamed of Mother, how she a house grounded in Black pepper seasoned in dance floor cultivation. We gather his memory before all the legendary elders, in living rooms & back alleys, for each place he rest his head was holy cathedral. He believed heaven was opulence. That the divine could truly own everything – in a ballroom at the edge of the universe where realness ascends above reality. He only ever wanted to be real,
to be whole & full, for all
to eat.