Poem - Middle Finger

The poem “Middle Finger” was inspired by the lines “I am not only a casualty / I am also a warrior” found in the book "I Am Your Sister: Collected and Unpublished writings of Audre Lorde (1985)"


Middle Finger

Mortality is the closing fate
promised by the watching gods
for those mortals on the face
of a world all will escape
sad casualty of many fates
each with the same end result
taking all from the souls
arrayed at the finish line

finality that none shall avoid
hence my focus on the now
taking arms to make a mark
not play the martyr in response
by a pen or the sword
drawing blood in last resort
fighting back against the dusk
while the sun is lost from sight

stones reside on the hill
some exclaim the consequence
of laying down before the end
already placed in victimhood
look to the others that inspire
beneath the stones their arms are thrust
a middle finger to the sky
still the warriors as in life.

© 2018. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20180817.