Saturday Class: Fever Dream (George, Breonna, and Trayvon)
In the dream, George sits in my poetry workshop.
The class is studying “Those Winter Sundays,” and he stares
At me quietly as the poem rolls from my mouth. He is still dressed in his death clothes.
Black tank top and black pants. He listens. His eyes blink slowly. Somehow,
I know he thinks of his mother. When I say, What did I know, what did I know
of love’s austere and lonely offices?
He cries.
Sometimes Breonna is there. She has perfectly curled hair with a touch
Of burgundy on the tips. She speaks sometimes and turns around in her desk
To check on George. Her lips are moving. I can’t hear. I don’t always understand
the language of the dead.
My hands spread open, and I say, I swear to keep the dead upon my mind,
Disdain for all time to be overglad. Gwendolyn Brooks stands in the corner
And nods. Breonna swings around in her desk to look at me. She says, yes. And I can
Hear her now. She wants to write a poem. She says, I need fourteen lines to
Tell you how I loved him.
Who? I say.
She says, My beautiful one. The one I left.
Breonna is the breath of a sonnet.
I sometimes forget Trayvon is here.
He walks to my desk and puts
A worn piece of notebook paper in my hand. He writes,
I am a seagull. A cloud.
I am dark. I am full of the moon. I am full with
Sun. I am a sky.
I am a star. I am an astronaut. I am
A flying machine. A rocket. A helicopter. A jet.
I am a bee and a hummingbird. Sometimes,
I’m even a fly buzzing around your eye.
Let me fly. I always
Want to be
Flying.
Trayvon nods at me. Walks back to his seat. George is still
Quiet. Eyes still blinking slowly. I close my eyes, spread my hands open
And chant, My best allegiances are to the dead. I repeat and repeat.
When my eyes open, he is staring at me.
His lips move. I can hear him.
He says, I know.
Notes:
With lines from “Those Winter Sundays” by Robert Hayden and “Mentors” by Gwendolyn
Brooks.
Source: Poetry (May 2026)