colored queer waters

"
Geneva was the wild one.
Geneva was a tart.
Geneva met a blue-eyed boy
and gave away her heart.

Geneva ran a roadhouse.
Geneva wasn’t sent
to college like the others:
Pomp’s pride her punishment.

She cooked out on the river,
watching the shore slide by,
her lips pursed into hardness,
her deep-set brown eyes dry.

They say she killed a woman
over a good black man
by braining the jealous heifer
with an iron frying pan.

They say, when she was eighty,
she got up late at night
and sneaked her old, white lover in
to make love, and to fight.

First they heard the tell-tale
singing of the springs,
then Geneva’s voice rang out:
I need to buy some things,

So next time, bring more money.
And bring more moxie, too.
I ain’t got no time to waste
on limp white mens like you.

Oh yeah? Well, Mister White Man,
it sure might be stone-white,
but my thing’s white as it is.
And you know damn well I’m right.

Now listen: take your heart pills
and pay the doctor mind.
If you up and die on me,
I’ll whip your white behind.

They tiptoed through the parlor
on heavy, time-slowed feet.
She watched him, from her front door,
walk down the dawnlit street.

Geneva was the wild one.
Geneva was a tart.
Geneva met a blue-eyed boy.
and gave away her heart.
"