Yellow Wallpaper
for Sonia Farmer

girl, I should have been,
could have been dead already,
dead and buried

you're giving me a reading list,
telling me who I've missed,
who I must read

I'd tell you of authors,
of what books contain,
open them like doors
as if chivalry were not dead

but to tell you what you must read
when you have to find your own feet
leave your own footprints on the beach

I've left mine,
nearly time I leapt into the ocean,
swam back to West Africa
or climbed to the top of Como Hill
and flew back home


© Obediah Michael Smith, 2007
6:16 a.m. 02/08/07