who looked just like her,
who would eventually beget a smart mouth,
who would beget a stagger-legged stance,
who would beget the two-piece,
and a line of women who don’t know how to play-fight.
Cain’s momma went off and raised her baby girl.
Went off being a way to say, she ran with a toddler
the weight of a full-grown watermelon in her arms.
Break of day being the time when a woman who needs
to escape can pretend to go off about some long, tedious,
servile task, so she won’t be looked for.
Cain’s momma had to deal with at least three men at the dinner table,
two of them she made, talking that dominion talk.
Trying to rename her Lilith, like the first sounds children make.
But this baby girl would be unaware that she was either baby or girl.
She wouldn’t know they’d escaped. She’d think they’d adventured.
She’d be so full of herself, filled to the brim with just her self.

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