I asked, still staring at the black words. Kramisha had sat down heavily on her bed, all of a sudden looking almost as exhausted as Stevie Rae. She was shaking her head back and forth, back and forth, making her orange and black hair dance against her smooth cheeks. “It just come to me, like all the stuff I write do. Things just come into my head, and then I write it down.” “What did you think it meant?” Jack asked, patting her arm gently, a lot like he patted Duchess (she was curled up by his feet). “I didn’t really think ’bout it. It come to me. I write it. That’s all.” She paused, glanced up at the poster board, and then looked quickly away, as if what she saw scared her. “Are these all poems you’ve written in the days since Stevie Rae Changed?” I shifted my attention to the other poems. There were several haiku. Eyes watching always Shadows in shadows they wait A black feather falls First accepted, loved Then betrayed—spit in the face Vengeance sweet like dots “Sweet, blessed Nyx.”
