Lose Control

 ⠀ ⠀ ⠀After Missy

Jorrell Watkins

“Moving is hard if you’re thinking

about what people are thinking.”

That’s what I’m thinking

our living room tuned

BET 106 & Park.

Soulja boy crank dat

superman, brobro—I go flailing

knock curio cabinet, look at god

not breaking Mama good China.

Threw neck in limbo, waddle

legs through pool palace

school dances we 

bleacher-cobble, errbody else

drop it low, whistle wild dey—

we waiting for Missy

egg us on floor, whispering

get ur freak on ghoul

pull us from our bleached husk

we scarecrow in twister

the beat, tightrope we wobble-

wobble people hacking guts

I stop dancing, look over

brobro gone.

*

At bars advertised as clubs

I hug the wall. DJ spins classics

Hot in Here, Cupid Shuffle, Lose Control

Missy don’t give up on nobody

I see you brobro, dougie’n, two-steppin’,

Missy done spun you hip-hop weapon

I’m sweatin’, gawkin’ at you snap-rock

torso-twist. All of the lights outshined

by yo’ white tee bridged-denim white sneaks

this buttonup aint cuttin’ up for this music

I came out to cut loose, drop this front,

throw my back out from going back in

this circle of dim and rhythm, spirits

dwell within. brobro, watch me go in.     

Jorrell Watkins is an interdisciplinary artist and educator. His chapbook, If Only the Sharks Would Bite, won the inaugural Desert Pavilion Chapbook Series in Poetry. His full-length collection, Play|House was shortlisted for the 2020 Philip Levine Prize for Poetry. Currently, he’s working towards his 2nd degree Black Belt in Karate.

Issue 3

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