The Sky Is a Mess of Horror Exhaust

Aaliyah died in the section of me
that stinks, the cortex where all
my African American inadequacies meet
to make a yam-textured memory. Surely
my grind pales compared to her work
of the middle, but that chart topper had
my preteen middle sofa-pinned and
dredging up, too often, a caramelized zeal
in marksmen. In men like my ex Donell,
who can’t legally know the sod of any school
yard or R. Kelly who’s southern now,
stepping on the surname of peachtrees. Sis, as a village
we need to want electric chairs when
it’s right. Let’s agree that every brother’s
obsession with what’s juvenile is
filthy, that it fuels and shapes a fellating
power, which is the sort of power we fold,
sweep, and bleach way too
gladly. My mother heard Aaliyah check a male
reporter once: I’m AH-liyah, like ah-men or Muhammad Ah-li,
never UH-liyah like uh-mazed or
uh-praise. Let’s not desert our names
for ease of journalism either. My full name
is my mother’s sole crack at poetry and
here I am, privileged to haul it like a tax
bracket or a satchel of proof. Is it Aaliyah’s name
or silk press sticking around for my
posthumous clapping? That evening she
fireworked the Bahamian sky we wore
bandeau Tommy bras in a mercy. I sliced
her mug out the red album front, hotglued it
to my Trapper Keeper’s spine and right
there, between unicorn and glitz, I held this
memorial of cardstock to my tits for
weeks. Sore sweets, ’90s R&B,
skin color the swirl of latte art, Aaliyah
enduring in zones that swell, glands
where all my African American arrogance
meets to make the yellowboniest
amnesia.