1: Between 2 Doors Between 2 doors the slave women carried food from cook shack to main house There was hunger from not eating from saying goodbye to that which you had created O, how it was prized and paraded between 2 doors 2: 2 Lines I dreamt I was in a soul train line on the left All the black people from my college alumni rocked back and forth Wearing suits and dresses no one would dance down the middle Too good to do the Lindy Hop the lines wouldn’t move They were a simple sway rocking back and forth in place 3: A Rectangle Draw 2 lines that are horizontal Connect 2 lines that are vertical on each end Trap something in the middle
Poem recommended by:
Angie Trudell Vasquez
Madison Poet Laureate, Madison Public Library Poet-in-Residence
Why I chose this poem:
Vida Cross serves on the Board for the Wisconsin Center for the Book (WCB) and is a liaison for WCB for the Wisconsin Poet Laureate Commission. A 2018 Pushcart nominee, her book of poetry, Bronzeville at Night:1949, debuted in 2017. She is a Cave Canem fellow who holds an MFA in Writing and an MFA in Filmmaking from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, an MA in English from Iowa State University and a BA from Knox College. Her work has appeared in several journals and anthologies including MilwaukeeNoir and A Civil Rights Retrospective.
Poem source:
Through This Door: Wisconsin in Poems
