Underground

“We are what we always were,” she said, “Underground.” From The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates.

Mama’d holler, “We have struggled for hundreds of years.

Are you not aware of that?”

[Silence]

So, what do you have to say?”

“We have always bumped our heads on roots” I’d answer, and think

we were like two moles down in the hole.

My mama, she said, “Watch your head!”

I’d say, “How we get out of here?”

She’d answer, “Like always, through the Underground.”