Kay Bell can be quoted: “If it makes me cry, sweat or bleed then it is worth writing about.” Her work appears in the book, ‘Brown Molasses Sunday: An Anthology of Black Women Writers.’ Also, “The Lily Poetry Review,” “Moko: Caribbean Arts and Letters, “The Write Launch,” “PRONG & amp;” “PROSY” and other venues. She earned an MFA at The City College of New York and lives in the Bronx.
Maybe Maybe, we all got on the flight to America; our sister and I shared the window seat; you sat on mummy's lap and then she left us. Maybe, you will have your first birthday in Apt 5A. Cake, ice cream and our sister’s cries balanced on the rooftop of grandma’s bad temper. Then, we grow up sitting stone faced on top of the blue velvet sofa, silent talking, believing mum’s coming back. We brave the brown leather straps; eat Dinty Moore beef stew, and read stories about siblings who were abandoned but still humane enough to leave bread for the birds. I can see us all now, checks stamped to our foreheads, overweight and voiceless; Maybe we will love each other? Subsequently, mum will return with war stories by courtesy of her husband who proudly smashes her face against the seasons. Then again, you can always pretend it never happened; slip out of mummy’s lap, cry on the white beach of Barbados, pick up your packages from the Mail service, eat Avocados out of your backyard and write Christmas cards to the 17-year-old that birthed you.