gods & kings

the men in my bloodline
walked like storms—
not toward peace
but through it,
like it was something
to be conquered.

i was raised
on gospel & grief,
on silence served
with sunday wine,

where the only prayers answered
were the ones we learned
not to ask.

they called themselves kings
but ruled nothing
but the dinner table,
stacked with unmet apologies
& full plates of rage.

i learned early:
a crown ain’t nothing
but a cage
if it don’t fit your head.
& god?

god was the whisper
between beatings,
the breath i held
beneath my tongue
when i wanted
to scream.

what kind of god
watches his sons
break their own hands
just to be worthy
of touch?

what kind of king
never teaches his heir
how to cry?

i’ve been unlearning
the myths since—

laying down
every armor
passed to me
like inheritance,

rewriting scripture
with softness,
with salt.

i ain’t looking
to reign.

i’m looking
to rest.

i don’t want to be
a god or a king.

just a man
who can look in the mirror
& call himself
free.

My Grandmother as Prayer Warrior

for the woman who knelt so we could stand

She never raised her voice—
not once.
But the house would tremble
when she prayed.

No need for pulpit or praise,
she sanctified the living room rug,
made altars out of ashtrays,
turned grief into gospel
with nothing but breath
& a Bible missing its back cover.

When the world gave us nothing
but “no,”
she’d murmur our names
into her cracked palms
like they were seeds
& whisper:
You gon’ bloom anyway.

This is the woman
who baptized me
in sweet tea & second chances,
sang Precious Lord
while shelling peas,
& taught me
that prayer don’t need pretty—
just purpose.

She prayed like fire:
not to burn the wicked,
but to light the way for the lost.

My grandmother didn’t fear no devil—
she’d already buried too many
to be scared of ghosts.

I watched her lay hands
on my mother’s grief,
rub the sorrow from her scalp
like it was dandruff,
like deliverance could come
through repetition.

She believed in a God
who listened
especially when the angels didn’t.
Believed in a love
that outlasted funerals,
believed in me
when I was nothing
but shaking bones
& poems too scared to be called holy.

& when I write now—
when I teach,
when I fold grief into metaphors,
when I let my voice quiver
but not disappear—
I know it’s because
her prayers
are still ringing through me.

I am the answered prayer
she never got to see bloom.

Still, I rise.
Still, I speak.
Still, I carry her name
like scripture beneath my tongue.

Because my grandmother
was a prayer warrior.
& I?

I am the war.

1000 Paper Cranes

He holds them
in his filthy, dirt-covered hands—
delicate wings smudged
with the proof of his undoing,
creases heavy with everything
he never said out loud.
I watch him,
this boy I once bled for,
folding promises into birds
that were never meant to fly.
They say if you fold a thousand,
your wish comes true—
but he never made it past ninety-seven
before calling it love.
The truth is:
no matter what we hold—
paper birds, broken hearts,
a past we pretend doesn’t still breathe between us—
we will never be perfect for each other.
Not in the way the poems promised.
Not in the way our hands once trembled
against each other’s skin
like we were trying to rewrite God.
We were too much ache
& not enough sanctuary.
Too many prayers
folded into silence.
Too many nights
I spent convincing myself
that pain was just
another word for staying.
So I let go—
not because I stopped loving him,
but because I finally loved myself
enough to stop confusing
his chaos for destiny.
& still—
some part of me
wants to believe
that somewhere,
those cranes
are flying.

*

Dr. Darius Phelps (he/him) is the author of My God’s Been Silent (Writ Large Press, 2026) and The Holy Ghost Lives In Her Laugh (Kith Books, 2026). A poet before anything else, his work bears witness to grief, faith, and the act of becoming—offering language as a form of liberation and light. Through the lens of poetic inquiry, Dr. Phelps explores how verse can function as pedagogy, healing and survival. Rooted in Black literary traditions and personal testimony, his poems navigate silence, ancestry, and resilience, creating sanctuaries for voices too often unheard. His work has been featured by Diode, Een Magazine, School Library Journal, and many more across platforms that champion the power of story to honor every body, every history, and every voice.