Faylita Hicks: He Puts a Knife to the Throat of a Woman
Dating On Campus (Circa 2015)
He puts a knife to the throat of a woman to see if she screams; covers her lips with his
fists—hopes she forgets how to bite— tears at her jeans; remarks I can love you too.
Not a girl or a child—she digs until the bottom is ever an open well, drowns silently—until
her skin is water, warped and nothing but a bridge between his heat and her rage. In the colleges,
they will call this culture. Theorize on its prevention, pretend that there is an answer to this inheritance, empathize with a million years worth of perforated cunts and their so burdened hips.
Yet, there will still be this:
"When you cut, at first you are unaware; innocent even—for now—when first you cut.”
Yet, there will still be this:
"See how she moves. Watch how she hums. She is the hungry moon, we are her fated stars."
He will love her to death. No one will stop him.
About My Daughter Who I Gave A Way
One day, she will notice gravel under her toes;
Calluses on the sole and heel; remark on the way
The sun slants its face whenever she approaches;
Whisper my name until it sounds like home—
And wonder—about all the years I ever was;
The prelude to her epic.
Being the woman who gave her: Two Names
Or Two Cities or Two Plagues; I relate
To the distinction between those fine lines
And these ditches. I have written her poems.
So many poems, my body is wet papyrus;
My tongue a vinegar glaze. I want to explain:
I whittle sound for a living; hatchet suns
In the back of a parlor, interpret chaos for quarters
And free coffee. I don’t know what this will mean to her,
If it ever does mean. I want to warn her about happiness;
Lesson her on the making of; suggest the ways in which to avoid it
Because the question of where she began will always ride her
Like a stallion from the red dirts of Oklahoma; hover
In her ear like a squealing wheel on the back half of the last train
Or an echo still hot on the broken floors of a cave in Taos.
Crested by a thousand nights of wondering, she will roam until
Finally she knows what it is to begin to end.
Faylita Hicks is a poet, rapper, spoken word artist and public speaker based in San Marcos, TX. She is currently a MFA Candidate in the Creative Writing Program at Sierra Nevada College.
