Christopher Greer is an educator and writer who lives in Alpharetta, GA. His work has appeared in, or is forthcoming from, Canary, Clarion, Inwood Indiana, and other small journals. He holds an MS from Purdue University.

For Tituba

How your body must’ve glittered under
ceremonial moonlight, unapologetically
glowing, wet with wondrous blasphemy.

Unchained elation
bleeding from the ballast of your being.

How your spirit must’ve writhed, smothered
beneath a blanket of enslavement—the insanity
of a new world’s unpredictability.

You must have moved with fury, quaking
from the freedom of a liberated flame.

Did they portend the peace you’d harbor
within those wild eyes burning, or
the resolve you’d carry far beyond
the firelight’s fleeting fury?

What a sight it must’ve been, proud
woman of the wilderness, to watch
your midnight promenade. I wish
I could have witnessed it—

I would have wrapped myself in
rapture and danced along with you.