On Black Girl Magic

 Whatever she says, it’s usually with a snap of her

 eyes, a cut of her lips, or a finger wag. It is not

 a performance of blackness — she is a Black woman.

 And these movements are hers, just like they were

 her mother’s. Just like they were her grandmother’

s.A tradition of survival. She’s learned how to get

 her point across 
neatly: a knife in a drawer full of

 spoons. She’s always accused of being too “rough” on people.

 Which is where our sisterhood thickens, molasses strong.

I too have lived on that block, in that house, first door

 to the right and you could find me: Angry Black Girl/Strong

 Black Girl/Black Girl You Call On When You Need to Get Things Done.

My Sister, T, is too this woman; unapologetically, listening to 

Beyoncé with her three Black daughters and her eldest Black son.

 Praying faithfully for forgiveness, because she’s begun to

 believe that she is hard to love. T, who snaps her eyes when 

pointing across the room, need not pray for forgiveness, I say.

 But it’s hard to believe someone like me, especially when the 

world is fixed on telling her how strong and loud and wrong she is.

 I introduce to her June Jordan’s mantra “I am not wrong: Wrong is

 not my name” and we weep a little between laughter. There are these

 moments that I hold close to my chest. The phone glued to my ear as 

we cackle between shit talk and ferocious laughter.