"Insight into a Flaming Mind" by Sheyenne Mitchell-Brown

Sheyenne Mitchell-Brown (she/her) is a poet from Oklahoma who dreams of a world where her poetic cries for political change do not need to exist. She dedicates this poem to those who are angry too.

A knot grows in my throat.

My head is light.

My body still but never my mind.

I am angry.

Anger is a word I was never allowed to use

but now it fills me up and I can’t make the flood of fire

stop.

It’s been coming since the year the world ended–

the year I died as I was and was born again better but full of restless indignation.

Like a phoenix rising from ashes of burned holy papers that fed me ignorance and lies–

a burning coming from my own hard-fought flame.

And I’ve been wronged personally

and wronged systemically

but I’ve tried to move on–

and now I look at the world and see all the others who've been wronged

but have bled for it.

I read, I write, and I scroll through a sea of suffering–

everything wrong in the world in my hands at all times

and all I can do is watch.

Behind the black frame, I watch as bodies stack

in semi-truck trailers

and prisons

collecting paychecks from the members gained

and unmarked graves

of children stolen

and the trees–

Oh, the trees.

Both a death sentence and

a dying commodity.

And I sit here.

My only

counter

a pen

and

some

words

on a

page.

May 2, 2023.