& might very well remain that way,
despite the best attempts
of our present overlord to resurrect
him without a single living
black mother’s permission.
If he should come, & be recognized
as anything other than the muted whisper
of a body interred, I wish his return
as some strange & ungovernable terror,
a ghost story turned live & direct ectoplasm
without warning: Frederick in the White
House kitchens, Frederick in the faucets,
Frederick posted up at every corner
of the Oval office, shredding documents
invisibly, a blade in each of his eighteen
laser hands. Go off, his more radical undead
colleagues will exclaim. You better tell that man
to keep your name out his mouth. But Frederick
Douglass doesn’t say a thing. Not yet.
He’s waiting for you & me, my grandmother
says. Frederick Douglass is irrevocably dead,
& refuses to ride until we are ready. Until
our prayers are knives or sheets of flame:
Hear us, O Beloved, Fugitive Saint: Defer
the rain. Grant us the strength of a rage
we can barely fathom. Make us
brave as the flock in the fist
of a storm. Unmoor every melody
they built from our screams. Steady
our dreams. Keep us warm.
