Ja’Quacy Kieron Minter
Anger With No Casket Is A Haunting
I’m minced within the metroplex again.
Big girls with big jobs—
Book
Big hotels just because we feel like it.
Buoyant or bountiful.
Nothing but loneliness.
Nothingness. Lethargy. Longevity.
Lockjaw: a mouth seldom closed—
Searching for somewhere
To house this anger.
Pandemics, politics, and performances.
Anger, with no casket, is a performance.
Anger,
With no casket,
is—
Itchy sheets and carton fresh eggs
Just don’t do it justice.
The metroplex and its busy streets
Just don’t give me justice.
It’s just us, grief, and anger—
Haunting me.
Holding on to me.
Tight, tender, and tumultuous.
Bent, bending, and buried.
Playing with myself.
Falling in love with myself.
Crossing my legs.
Inside and out.
At the opera. In the city.
inhaling oxygen.
Exhaling bullets.
Anger,
if not acknowledged,
is an exhaled bullet.
Queer black boy.
Gone too soon.
Singing hymnals and hollow tunes.
Giving speeches on Easter Sunday.
Queer.
Confused.
Concussed.
Black, bountiful, and buoyant.
Feet too big. Shirt too tall.
Teeth too sweet. Pants too small.
A casket. A requiem.
Anger left behind
Like a cavity—
Chewing.
One loose letter
After another:
Stamina.
Syntax.
Simplicity.
Easter.
Where the hell is my resurrection?
Novelty
A cup of coffee
And a burrito
On pay day
Ain’t good enough.
I need sustenance.
Novelty.
I need today
to be
A day
where life
is nothing more than
A bounce house—
buoyant and naive—
I miss my childhood.
I miss my innocence.
I’m just a sweetheart—
Sipping on iced coffee
In repetition: mimicry.
Back: hurting.
Nails: numb.
Feet: swollen
Near the toes—
Buried beneath
My nine-to-five.
I miss my innocence.
I miss the days when
The Office—
Was made—
for television
Life was simple then.
We drank from the hose.
Pissed on brick houses—
Whether we lived in them or not.
Bullied or bulleted,
We walked the streets for hours
Unbothered. Unscathed. Unbroken—
Because the roads were safe,
The doors were unlocked,
And our classmates’ chests
Existed
Without
Bullets.
My hair: nappy.
My neck: smelly.
My belly: full.
My body: a slut. A sissy. A novelty.
Box after box after box of cereal—
Collecting.
Controlling.
Contorting.
Caught within the confines
Of fiber, corn, and oats—
God,
I miss my childhood.
I miss being my mother’s
Novelty.
The Rinse Cycle
A mother is nothing more than—
Loose change left behind—
Tucked, tight, and tangled
In fresh sheets—
My mother can withstand anything.
She can fold everything:
Denim jackets
Jean shorts
Purple dress shirts—
Anything.
Everything.
In any shape—
And any form—
at every corner—
Except for my anger.
Fiddling with silk and polyester.
Turning washcloths into dish rags.
Denim into disillusionment.
Like a hand-me-down: a ritual.
A cycle.
The rinse cycle.
Black babies—
Born American—
Are born
Angry.
Black mamas—
Born angry—
Are born
American.
Burdened.
Broken from the inside out
Like candied yams,
Cornbread,
And c-sections—
Cut. Lanced. Incision.
Another black girl.
Gone too soon.
Fertile. Maternal. Medicinal.
Another fetus: missing.
Another body: buried.
Another abdomen: a casket.
Another chest: a tombstone.
Beneath the laundry,
The wash rags,
And disillusionment:
A ritual.
A cycle.
The rinse cycle.
Ja’Quacy Kieron Minter is an emerging author and higher-education professional from Mount Pleasant, Texas. His literary work has appeared in The Queer South Zine, Testament: A Rural Anthology, 1956 Magazine at the University of Alabama, publications by Black Minds Publishing, and the Fenix Art Exhibit in Fayetteville, Arkansas. His interdisciplinary writing engages grief, memory, nostalgia, religious rhetoric, mental health, love, pain, and coming-of-age narratives through a critical and autobiographical lens.
Minter serves as the Director of Student Development at Northeast Texas Community College, where his professional work centers on student advocacy, leadership development, and institutional support for historically marginalized populations. In 2022, he received $10,000 in cash prizes after winning the Everett Holle Award in forensic (speech and debate) competition at the University of Alabama, recognizing excellence in competitive rhetoric and performance.
His debut chapbook, Anger With No Casket Is a Haunting, debuted as a #1 bestseller in the Young Adult Boys & Men’s Issues category in 2025. He is currently completing his debut memoir, When I Drink, I Drink From Nana’s China: Suicide, Survival, and Success, which examines survivorship, identity formation, and the intersections of personal trauma and professional achievement.
Banner Art:
Gordon Parks, Evening, 1995, The Gordon Parks Foundation
