CORINNE BINNINGS

The Ananda Alert system for reporting missing children was launched on May 19, 2009, in honour of Ananda Dean, an 11-year-old student of the Swallowfield All-Age School, who went missing on September 17, 2008.

I don’t play
in water
dat wash me
above the ankle anymore

an’ I stop giggling
soon as a man
look too long
at my too young chest

all I know is
dem things mean
death
I don’t know how

I know
but something
tell me
that water

that wander
too far up
the legs mean
me no good

an man
dat look too hard
at a girl-child’s chest
will soon

turn his eyes up
her legs
cause dat’s all
man know

then one day
search party
find you headless
or under

some deep water
body mangled
in a death pose
hands and legs

poised as if for flight
I know death
not partial
that old hog

take as he wish
and he won’t stop
now       so if water
come and man

come      I’ll take my legs
and my laughter
and run fast fast

Corrine is a Jamaican poet and teacher who recently completed the MFA Creative Writing (Poetry) program at Florida Atlantic University (FAU). She has published both Poetry and Creative Nonfiction the Dark River Review, Brine and The Caribbean Writer. Corrine seeks, simply, to write what the tongue finds too heavy to say; her writing focuses on, among other things, historical, personal and collective trauma. She is currently looking for a publisher for her first manuscript, Residue, while working on the second.