The Wardrobe’s Best Dressed: Body Not My Own by Tanque R. Jones

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content warning for slavery

Schematics

With a net capture youth,
collar him about the prime of life,
drag her into old age.
A day unto eight months unto sixty years.
Men, women no longer
men and women. Un-human. Now
male or female, labels to denote breeding class.
A Chloe’s worth twice as much as a Ruth,
get two browns for the price of one yellow,
darkies half off.

A floating abacus—
black body beads shifted
from one side to the other.

Slave	Sex	Age	Class
Chloe	Female	20	Yellow
Hany	Female	17	Brown
Homer	Male	15	Black
James	Male	50	Black
July	Male	23	Black
Paris	Male	20	Black
Ruth	Female	60	Black
Scipio	Male	8 months	Black
Venus	Female	19	Black

Ignorance doles out benevolence. How much
tenderer the wound if they knew
of the power afforded the true owners of their names.
Better black Homer not command the words
to transcribe this odyssey or the goddess of hate.
July knows only that he was born
during the hottest month that summer,
not which day or of ancient rulers.
On a Charleston plantation

Paris will be found. He doesn’t possess explanations
to life’s riddles. No slave touches such notions
as beauty or prosperity. Even Venus is unaccustomed to love,
her sex and fertility perverted.

Monikers meant to mock
missing the attachment of a last name
to imply they belong.
All property belonging to no one.

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