Deaf American Poetry: An Anthology

It Was His Movin’ Hands

Kristi Merriweather 257 It Was His Movin’ Hands Know what I mean, Don’t you just know that feeling of that thing white folks call electricity sparking that thing black folks like us call good vibes that gets that funky eyeplay started our smiles manifesting, rebelling against our wishes to appear kool, breezy kind of c-oo-ool, superfly yeah, like that, magick kickin’ in, sirens a-blarin’ peripheral vision gone malfunctioning shoot, it’s obvious we’re losin’ the control game, shamelessly, breakin’ the rules, ah, but what’s deafsista like me gonna do, gonna do with her mind shootin’ up into Milky Way, outta my reach, when that fine brotha that we heard to be with all that that we ladies call all that, dang, done the crime of visiblin’ his presence to my eyes, Kristi Merriweather 258 on the path to me, nearer, had the nerve to even pick up his chiseled hands shapin’ them, so familiar, Hey, what was that, girl, did I see right? lord, he be signin’, gonna be saying Hail Marys, Ebonic style, if he be of non-hearing species Ain’t nothing else gettin’ me that 100 volts of good vibes like a M.I.A. finally returning to the land out of fantasyisland, Don’t be botherin’ me now, I busy workin’ it, Magick in full effect now. ...