About Yone. The background texture of these sections are from a menu from a restaurant my Obaba worked in in the nineties, named Kyoto, which closed in 1995. When it closed she took a full menu with her. The first section has the marbled grey-and-white background of the todays specials menu, with some orangey food splattered on it. The second section is blank white with a rearranged header, because it was the sushi order form guests would fill out.

Scrapbooks
by Nikki Giovanni

it's funny that smells and sounds return
so all alone uncalled unneeded
on a sweaty night as i sit armed
with coffee and cigarettes waiting

sometimes it seems
my life is a scrapbook

i usta get 1.50 per week
for various duties unperformed
while i read green dolphin street 
and the sun is my undoing
never understanding my exclusion
but knowing quite clearly the hero
is always misunderstood
though always right in the end

roy gave me a yellow carnation
that year for the junior prom

the red rose was from michael
who was the prettiest boy i’d ever known
he took me to the jack and jill dance      
and left me sitting in the corner until      
the slow drags came on then he danced
real tight and sweated out my bangs
i had a white leather monstrosity that passed
for taste in my adolescence pressed with dances
undanced though the songs were melodious

and somehow three or four books were filled
with proms and parties and programs that
my grandmother made me go to
for “culture” so that i could be      
a lady      
my favorite is the fisk book with clippings      
of the forum and notes from the dean of women
saying “you are on social probation” and “you are
suspended from fisk”
and letters from my mother saying “behave yourself”  
and letters from my grandmother reminding me
“your grandfather graduated fisk in 1905” and not
to try to run the school
but mostly notes from alvin asking when
was i coming over
again
i purchased a blue canvas notebook for the refrain

it’s really something when you sit
watching dawn peep over apartment buildings
that seemed so ominous during the night and see      
pages of smiling pictures        groups of girls throwing      
pillows        couples staring nervously ahead as if they      
think the kodak will eat them        someone with a ponytail     
and a miles davis record        a lady with an afro pointing     
joyously to a diploma        a girl in a brown tan and red  
bathing suit holding a baby that looks like you 
and now there is a black leather book filled
efficiently by a clipping service
and a pile of unanswered letters that remind
you to love those who love you
and i sit at dawn
all my defenses gone sometimes
listening to something cool sometimes
hearing tears on my pillow
and know there must be other books
filled with failures and family and friends
that perhaps one day i can unfold
for my grandchildren