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The Fiesta of Forgotten Negras

Yo Georgia D. Johnson is here!! and she got

enough drinks for e’erbody, though she

rarely turnts up, those poetgirls can

get so fussy so we are looking especially

to MIZZ JEZEBEL over there, spiritual girlie

twisting and shuddering

them Biblical hips and kicking that man coming over

with her high heel’s silver spine. Don’t forget about

(oh, no, she already twerking), rapper Lisa M

to the left gyrating to Lisa Lopez, who

got them bars as Saweetie-sweet as Rapsody, who

fished all the Scrubs from the gutter and

is presently

shooting ‘em down with her bullet-raps.

So we dancin’, dancin’ to the pump and full bloom

of the beat; the big sound smudges and bunches

until it’s something you feel like you know

something thick enough to block your throat,

something huge enough to revive or kill you,

but look at us, us damn beautiful women,

we only revive.

Our hips shake shake shake shake

to an ever-living bass.

x

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SARAH BAARTMAN MARY MAG SWAG

is what I got GURL

you got to see me shake and pounce.

What I got behind me,

you don’t need to know, it ain’t for pageantries

never was, that backside flopping huge,

the tigolbiddies are just for my own

loving pleasure.

We ain’t body-shapes, we full-blooming,

plush and pondering plunder, we got that

forgotten woman swag, we got that

theydon’tknowus bounce we got that

ne’erdowelltill we DO IT, ride.

Hey, Mary, let’s shake it for ourselves

if anyone wants to come along,

that’s all on them.

x

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Jennifer Maritza McCauley is the author of the short story collection WHEN TRYING TO RETURN HOME (Counterpoint), a New York Times Editors’ Choice; SCAR ON/SCAR OFF (Stalking Horse Press), an IPPY-award winning cross-genre collection; and Kinds of Grace (Flowersong Press), a poetry collection called a Must-Read by Columbia Daily, Bookshop, Letras Latinas, Hip Latina and elsewhere. Her speculative fiction collection NEON STEEL (Cornerstone Press/U.Wisc-Stevens Point) will be released in February 2026. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Kimbilio and Canto Mundo and her work has been called a Must-Read by Today, Kirkus Reviews, Columbia Daily Tribune, Elle, Latinx in Publishing, and Ms. Magazine, among others. She is an assistant professor of English at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, summer faculty at the Yale Writers’ Workshop, and fiction editor at Pleiades.