words by ava

I tried to change/Closed my mouth more/Tried to be softer, prettier, less/Awake

The thing is/ I know I know/ but I can’t know, know, because knowing hasn’t been granted to me. The thing is/I can’t know. I know even if I don’t know that I know. Knowing has been ripped from my soul/I lost the tug of war. I know. But I know nothing. I have lost all certainty/I have lost the battle to him with myself. The thing is/ knowing but wishing you didn’t know isn’t the same as not knowing at all. The thing is you wish you didn’t know. And so I’ll convince myself/ that I don’t know/ not really knowing/ that I know nothing/ know nothing but hysterics and overreactions. I’ve decided! I know nothing/But I know. 

I sat alone and bent at the waist and begged for God

The thing is/ I thought I’d find myself on the other side of this war trench/ at the end of the downtrodden(s’)path/that after stumbling upon/ the eroded spines of the past women/ that had fallen/ that I’d find more than a beaten/ weather-beaten dress/ and mud-caked feet. The thing is/I thought I’d find myself/ I thought I’d find you. The thing is/ I thought with enough tears/ with enough pleas, pleases, and prayers/I thought you’d bring him back to me/whole/erase the pain/erase what has been coiled deep/deep inside me/intuition/the thing is/ i’ve never more wanted more/to be wrong. I crossed the bridge/and turned around/sat in the sagging middle/I could see the other side/no/I turned around, went back across.

I swallowed a sword/For dominion at your feet

I’d rather know I know/I don’t know/than know, know, really know. I’d rather sit at my dinner table/with you/the icy accusations I had prepared, melt/ with your smile/un-be- knowest/ the ice reforms at my feet/till I fall at my knees/my heart frozen/with ice/that tries to mend what you have broken. The thing is/ I’d rather sit in your lap/on your arm/what they want/the perfect black couple/in the spotlight/loyal to a fault/ forever. The thing is/you can’t be cheating/you can’t bring me down/they can’t be right/ about us/about black love/about black men/about you.

But still inside me/ coiled deep/ was the need to know/Are you cheating/are you cheating/cheating on me?