right to a life

just yesterday her Black girl
steps were set to a 
jump rope,
four-square, 
hopscotch 
beat.
but today she must 
somehow find a way 
to hip-hop from state 
to state 
to get healthcare 
to take care of 
business before it’s 
too late to plan parenthood
unencumbered by the state. 

she’s grown up way too fast. 
the state of affairs changed. 
with uncertain resolve she says,
“It’s no game”
“It’s complicated”
“It’s up to me to decide”

…but the decision condemning her to 
a life of poverty was made before Dobbs.
even before the rollback of Roe left her with 
little meat on the bone of her options in life,
decisions were made to mass incarcerate
her and her boyfriend and her brother. 

her dreams of a different life got stuffed into 
the pockets of politicians and justices who 
don’t want to know her,
don’t want to see her,
don’t want to know 
what 
justice 
looks like 
on a minimum wage. 

David W. Janey is a Boston-based African-American poet and essayist. He writes about racial justice, social change, personal memory/growth, and lessons learned from nature. David is a university administrator by day and his writing has appeared in the Solstice Magazine Features Blog, WBUR’s Cognoscenti, Boston University’s BU Today, Wordpeace Journal, and Pride and a Paycheck.