ode to the woman who chased him two blocks with a crow bar

You
woke me from my nap
and at first
I wanted you to go away
you
black woman
he
white man
tension settled into the concrete

You
bolted to ground
he
queasy like
sour milk

and then
i swear
your voice
was harmony
it was power
it was 'what did you call me?'

He
was dissonant
distant
still a block away
but i could hear
the n word
as it sliced
the humidity

I
unsettled
as summer sparring
of strangers
floated
3 stories up
on heat waves

I
thought of
Serena Williams
Her body called out

and now i think of
Claudia Rankine
how she helped me understand
that Williams
was read as insane

He
read you as insane
'you dumb bitch'
'don't act like
one then'
He
naiive
could only see
skin
and
crowbar
could only
feel his own fear

You
stood ground
held centuries
of confederate flags raised
in one iron bar

You
deserve to be craddled
by history books

I
have spent all five days
since thinking of you

It is not my place
to thank you
or be happy for you
or know you
or know why you picked up that crowbar
or know how that word
spit from white mouth
made you feel
what it made you think of

but you deserve
everything

much more than this
poem