Like This

I remember her like thisBlack hair, nappy and naturalWrapped in a gaily colored scarf.Like thisThe way her body moved when she spokeAs graceful as a pirouetteAs powerful as a hurricane.Like thisThe way her laugh would start in her bellyMove through her bodyAnd shake the whole room.Like thisThe way her voice wouldfill with passionWhen talking about teachingOr the fluteOr beauty.Like thisHow she always found the brillianceIn anyoneRegardless of the mess left by someone else.Like thisHow her eyes would brighten with furyAt instances of injusticeHow she would rage at the racism, sexism and queerphobiaThat claimed the lives of those she called FamilyHow she would rant about the brokennessOf America’s Public School SystemAnd still pour her heartSoulMindInto trying to save just ONE brown childFrom that monstrous machine that would grind us to dustAnd jail the entrails.But I also remember her like thisBody ravaged by the harsh toxins of ChemoHands, pale and peelingHair, graying and thinningEyes, fearful and sad.Like thisHow she showed up to teach every day thatShe wasn’t felled by that life-prolonging poison.Like thisHow she lay in the hospital bedMind racing faster than the Hadron Collider and yetImpotent to speakBreathing labored harder than the contractions of revolutions and yetHolding on to life with every last ounce of power left in her.She told me onceI thought I would die aloneI took her hands into my own(They were already cold)And I told herNeverYou saved this brown child and you willNever be alone.I remember her like the warrior she was.