ON COTTON (thinking of South Carolina)

if you’ve ever stuck your
fingers in a cotton boll
you’d know
cotton don’t never
want to be picked
you’d know cotton
bites and nips at nailbeds
makes cuticles bitter
black cherries

and so i wonder
if my great-great-anyone
wept on line with sack in tow
maybe whispering a chant
of comraderie
of connection to the downy
for knowing what
it meant to be
picked and plucked
and ripped from home

twisted and tightened
and spun into yarn