Walk on Water

by Yvette R. Murray

Once upon a time on vacation I met a beautiful conch shell
My mind tasted conch fritters/conch salad
My mind danced with sweet carols of the Caribbean. But
it sought my ethos,
watered the rhythms within my soul
My mind then heard urgent African dialects:
beautiful Hausa, rhythmic Igbo and exquisite Yoruba
A reckoning touched my genome
The fourth generation removed is loud whispers
My mind captured all these burning words
understood all the messages:
The only way back is the way we came,
Queen Ocean, full of death, blue and deep.
Queen Ocean, full of death, blue and deep,
the only way back is the way we came
A mind must understand these messages
A mind must capture the words
Hear its own loud whispers
Within feel reckoning/hear
beautiful Hausa, rhythmic Igbo and exquisite Yoruba
Water the rhythms within its soul
Command its ethos
A mind can dance with sweet carols of the Caribbean
taste conch fritters/conch salad
when it meets a conch shell on vacation

Yvette R. Murray received her B.A. in English from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She has been published in Fall Lines, The Petigru Review, Catfish Stew, Barzakh, Genesis Science Fiction magazine, forthcoming in Emrys Journal and Call and Response Journal. She is a 2020 Watering Hole Fellow and a 2019 Pushcart Prize nominee. Presently, she is working on her first poetry collection and a children’s book series.