Poems

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Why I don’t write about George Floyd

1941 –

Because there is too much to say
Because I have nothing to say
Because I don’t know what to say
Because everything has been said
Because it hurts too much to say
What can I say what can I say
Something is stuck in my throat
Something is stuck like an apple
Something is stuck like a knife
Something is stuffed like a foot
Something is stuffed like a body

The author of several books of poetry, Toi Derricotte is cofounder of Cave Canem, a national poetry organization committed to cultivating the artistic and professional growth of African American poets. She served as a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets from 2012 to 2017.

Themes

About this Poem

“There was so much that my parents and grandparents, escaping from the violence of the South and their own personal histories of trauma, didn’t (and wouldn’t!) talk about. They didn’t want their children to grow up with the same fears. We had to move on. The killing of George Floyd brought up a grief that feels as though it has been put away for centuries. The poem is about the long, hard process of reclamation.”
—Toi Derricotte

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The blue nightgown

^{Can a simple dress become a coping mechanism?
—NPR August 18, 2020}

So many years of misguided self-reflection,
examining every curve in the mirror! Alone,
locked down, I buy online three ice blue
nightgowns I discover I can live in. I glide
through living room, dining room, hall, off the floor

Toi Derricotte

2021

The blessed angels

How much like
angels are these tall
gladiolas in a vase on my coffee
table, as if in a bunch
whispering. How slender
and artless, how scandalously
alive, each with its own
humors and pulse. Each weight-
bearing stem is the stem
of a thought through which
aspires the blood-metal of stars. Each heart
is a gift for the king. When
I was a child, my mother and aunts
would sit in the kitchen
gossiping. One would tip
her head toward me, “Little Ears,”
she’d warn, and the whole room
went silent. Now, before sunrise,
what secrets I am told!—being
quieter than blossoms and near invisible.

Toi Derricotte

2018

A Place in the Country

We like the houses here.
We circle the lake turning
into dark cleavages, dense-packed gleamings.
We could live here, we say.
We’re smiling, but thinking
of the houses at the last resort:
The real estate agent looked surprised
when she saw Bruce’s face; then flipped

Toi Derricotte

2017

Poems

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Why I don’t write about George Floyd

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