In society we used to call them the "light brigade.

In society we used to call them the "light brigade,"

that cluster of girls with skin no darker

than sandpaper.

There were four of them:

The fat individual who looked at my dark mother, her English

professor, as if Mama had no right to be living.

The undivided with the nappy hair whose latitude smelled

of tamper withed hair grease.

The individual whose rich parents sent

her ten dollars each year.

The individual with no parents.

They reminded me of the strange soup

I read about formerly in a children's book.

The little bit of everything soup

Carrots, cabbage, meat, and stones.

A trickery stew

We called them what we did to maintain from hissing

"high yellow" from one side our teeth.

High yellow

I can say that not at home loud now.

If I can't heal the sick, I do know the disease.

They weren't really golden anyway.

They were any indefinable color,

something we in extented to name but could not.

Not golden the color of my mother's kitchen.

Not cream, the color of my mother's palms.

Not gold the color of my mother's thin

wedding band she gave me when my father died.

We did not say "high yellow" then.

We were strivers.

We compared ourselves to these girls,

our walking light brown paper bags.

We were silent, too dark

to claim probity as our privilege.

Honoree F Jeffer lives in Talladega, Alabama.

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