Praisesong for a Black Boss

by Jasmine Games

Praise be to

you who bent a policy 

to fit all bodies:

Although none of my bottom hung,

They shamed my silhouette

when they saw the shadow of

my summer frame in jeaned shorts 

and tried to slip me red.

Yet— this problem never made it to my desk.

You cut your colleagues at the sleeves;

you took on the distress.

In a world that tailors us

to be made smaller,

you made room for me to fit.

Let every policy picked at the seams  

be pricked with your needle.

Let every dark dyed cloth

stay rinsed raw, unbleached. 

Let every hemline rise against

the corporate sewing machine.

For you did not just change a rule;

you binded yourself to every Black girl 

fighting bias tape and runway regimes. 

You found a hole in the system 

and made it an appliqué. 

You could have quit,

but instead, you became a quilt

when you covered me.