I Go South to Rise

I’m leaving New York—

for Virginia, where freedom still breathes.

Not in slogans, but in soil.

Not in glass, but in memory.

New York taught me how to speak.

Virginia reminds me why.

In the city, freedom became a brand—

flashing, shouting, forgetting.

In the South, it’s still a breath held

in Mayflower wind and red clay,

like my grandmother’s porch,

where stories outlived silence.

Not to escape—

but to remember.

To rise where freedom once began.

I go south to rise.