WritersIsland-prompt-Envision

This is the prompt:

http://writersisland.wordpress.com/2010/10/09/prompt-24-for-2010-envision/

 

> The twenty fourth prompt for 2010, an image I entitled: “ENVISION”.

You can let yourself be inspired by the title. What are the levels of meaning one might attach to the word ‘envision’? A few synonyms are: conceive, conjure, dream, envisage, imagine, fancy, fantasize, feature, ideate, picture, see, and visualize.

Or let the image itself evoke in you the inspiration to write. Hold it for a while in your mind’s eye, then whatever it is that strikes you as you view, express it.

 

Yehudah (יְהוּדָ)

“That land there”, he points
“That was Jesse’s.”
We look and I consider
the bramble imprisoned by razor wire
and the story:
a day of hard words over cotton prices
followed by
a night filled with the sound of slaughtered pigs
and my great grandfather fleeing for his life to the big city
My Jewish family would call this a pogram;
my Black one—just business as usual—
Black folk having their land stolen.
“They say that we could get that land back,” my elder says.
The words hang in the air, an unanswered question
and in my mother’s family tree
Jesse follows Jesse with ne’er a David in sight.
I’ll tell you when the Messiah is here.
When Jesse’s David pastures his horse again
in that field
over there.

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