Feeling Fucked Up

by Etheridge Knight

Lord she's gone done left me done packed / up and split /
and I with no way to make her come back and everywhere the world
is bare bright bone white crystal sand glistens

dope death dead dying and jiving drove her away made her take her laughter and her smiles
and her softness and her midnight sighs--

Fuck Coltrane and music and clouds drifting in the sky
fuck the sea and trees and the sky and birds and alligators
and all the animals that roam the earth

fuck marx and mao fuck fidel and nkrumah and democracy and communism fuck smack and pot and red ripe tomatoes fuck joseph fuck mary fuck god jesus and all the disciples fuck fanon nixon and malcom fuck the revolution fuck freedom fuck the whole muthafucking thing

all i want now is my woman back
so my soul can sing 

Knight, Etheridge. “Feeling Fucked Up.” 1986. Poetry Foundation. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/48752/feeling-fucked-up. Accessed August 16, 2026.