Gypsy Shack Poem by Brandon Roy

On a tiny stool sits an old black gypsy woman
Her head wrapped a faded tignon
Grey tinted granny glasses
Corn pipe on her lips
A double-barreled shot-gun sat on her lap
A jug of cachaca to her side
Some times she and the old widow woman
would drink and smoke late into the night
They were not afraid
Her face weathered by time
Wrinkled from the drink
Her eyes, elegant, youthful
bright, she could see past you
She was not some card cutting bone reader
She would rather drink tea leaves than read them
To her palms are for shaken, stars are for gazin and numbers
are for figurin how much you owed her for spending her time
explaining the real world versus nonsense

She was born with a veil over her face, an extra finger and thirteen toes. She has a gift. People would praise her to which she would reply every gift is a curse.

We, in the neighborhood, called her Madame Jeanette
They say she know spells
We know she can sweep her floor and weave tales
Sometime you would pass her
and she would be drunk
She would look at one of us and say something bad bout to happen

and we ask why

She would only say, I saw a black cloud over your left shoulder out the corner of my eye

One night she was crushing shells and touched the sideway
She say don't miss her
The street lights switched off
and she was gone