i shall take
your smell
inside me.
HAIKU
i am a small piece
of yellow flesh taking shelter
like a leper.
BLUES HAIKU
his face like chiseled
china his eyes clotting
around rubber asses.
HAIKU
to be lifted in
smoke to be cast in iron
remembering the fire.
TANKA
woman without heat
blankets herself with eyes
avoiding the cock’s walk.
a woman in seclusion
dreams of secreting milk.
HAIKU
it was nothing big
just no one to put suntan
lotion on my back.
HAIKU
the sea murmuring
dialect remember che
alive in my veins.
SONKU
what i want
from you can
you give? what
i give to
you do you
want? hey? hey?
HAIKU
i hear your breath
in the faraway room
breathing castanets.
HAIKU
i smell you on my
skin ravishing my veins
i see your sweat running.
HAIKU [for Joe Barry]
when i imagine
you i recall a river
flowing with eyes.
HAIKU
red orange breasts sweet
as chocolate touch my lips
wild bones up for sale
HAIKU
and i am flesh burnt
red charcoal black gift wrapped in
philadelphia blood.
HAIKU
this poem is for me
who could not speak your death
still i laugh and spin
SHORT POEM
quite often without
you i am at a loss for
the day.
HAIKU 1 [for Bill and Camille]
but i am left with
flesh that hangs like yellow sails
hear my voice knocking.
HAIKU 2
my bones migrate in
red noise like pinched wings
they stream white ashes.
HAIKU
do you want ashes
where your hands used to be
other faces will come.
HAIKU
if i were an old
woman all my veins could hold
my laughter in check.
HAIKU
you are rock garden
austere in your loving
in exile from touch.
TANKA
to surround yourself with
arms that will not hold you
to dream yourself home
where the road is dust
and dissolves in purple.
SONKU
to worship
until i
become stone
to love
until i
become bone.
HAIKU
[for Bill and Camille]
my bones hang to
gether like pinched dragonflies
shake loose my skin.
In This Wet Season
HAIKU [for Sophie and Val]
in this wet season
of children raining hands
we catch birds in flight.
A POEM FOR ELLA FITZGERALD
when she came on the stage, this Ella
there were rumors of hurricanes and
over the rooftops of concert stages
the moon turned red in the sky,
it was Ella, Ella.
queen Ella had come
and words spilled out
leaving a trail of witnesses smiling
amen—amen—a woman—a woman.
she began
this three agèd woman
nightingales in her throat
and squads of horns came out
to greet her.
streams of violins and pianos
splashed their welcome
and our stained glass silences
our braided spaces
unraveled
opened up
said who’s that coming?
who’s that knocking at the door?
whose voice lingers on
that stage gone mad with
perdido. perdido. perdido.
i lost my heart in toledooooooo.
whose voice is climbing
up this morning chimney
smoking with life
carrying her basket of words
a tisket a tasket
my little yellow
basket—i wrote a
letter to my mom and
on the way i dropped it—
was it red … no no no no
was it green … no nono no
was it blue … no no no no
just a little yellow
voice rescuing razor thin lyrics
from hopscotching dreams.
we first watched her navigating
an apollo stage amid high-stepping
yellow legs
we watched her watching us
shiny and pure woman
sugar and spice woman
her voice a nun’s whisper
her voice pouring out
guitar thickened blues,
her voice a faraway horn
questioning the wind,
and she became Ella,
first lady of tongues
Ella cruising our veins
voice walking on water
crossed in prayer,
she became holy
a thousand sermons
concealed in her bones
as she raised them in a
symphonic shudder
carrying our sighs into
her bloodstream.
this voice, chasing the
morning waves,
this Ella-tonian voice soft
like four layers of lace.
when i die Ella
tell the whole joint
please, please, don’t talk
about me when i’m gone …
i remember waiting one nite for her appearance
audience impatient at the lateness
of musicians,
i remember it was april
and the flowers ran yellow
the sun downpoured yellow butterflies
and the day was yellow and silent
all of spring held us
in a single drop of blood.
when she appeared on stage
she became Nut arching over us
feet and hands placed on the stage
music flowing from her breasts
she swallowed the sun
sang confessions from the evening stars
made earth divulge her secrets
gave birth to skies in her song
remade the insistent air
and we became anointed found
inside her bop
bop bop dowa
bop bop doowaaa
bop bop dooooowaaaa
Lady. Lady. Lady.
be good. be good
to me.
to you. to us all
cuz we just some lonesome babes
in the woods
hey lady. sweetellalady
Lady. Lady. Lady. be gooooood
ELLA ELLA ELLALADY
be good
gooooood
goooooood …
A SONG FOR SWEET HONEY IN THE ROCK
see me through
your own eyes
i am here.
don’t look for me
in poems
i’m not there.
don’t look for me in
shadowy faces
i’m not there.
&nbs
p; see me through
your own eyes
i am here.
once. when or with whom
i disappeared went
into hiding behind
my own skull
wasn’t seen for a decade or two
wasn’t seen for a decade or two.
now i am back
carrying my life in a small bag
now i am back
holding open my hands
holding open my hands.
see me through
your own smile
i am here.
see me through
your own smell
i am here.
see me through
your own eyes
i am here
i am here…
LOVE POEM [for Tupac]
1.
we smell the
wounds hear the
red vowels
from your tongue.
the old ones
say we don’t
die we are
just passing
through into
another space.
i say they
have tried to
cut out your
heart and eat
it slowly.
we stretch our
ears to hear
your blood young
warrior.
2.
where are your fathers?
i see your mothers gathering
around your wounds folding
your arms shutting your
eyes wrapping you in prayer.
where are the fathers?
zootsuited eyes dancing
their days away.
what have they taught you
about power and peace.
where are the fathers
strutting their furlined
intellect bowing their
faces in the crotch
of academia and corporations
burying their tongues
in lunchtime pink
and black pussies
where are the fathers to teach
beyond stayinschooluse
acondomstrikewhilethe
iron’shotkeephopealive.
where have the fathers buried their voices?
3.
whose gold is carrying you home?
whose wealth is walking you through
this urban terror? whose greed
left you shipwrecked with golden
eyes staring in sudden death?
4.
you were in
a place hot
at the edge
of our minds.
you were in
a new world
a country
pushing with
blk corpses
distinct with
paleness and
it swallowed
you whole.
5.
i will not
burp you up.
i hold you
close to my heart.
LOVE CONVERSATION
[AIDS day 1994 in Philadelphia, for Essex Hemphill]
How are you doin sistah?
fine
how you doin girl?
i said i was doin okay.
But how you really doing
i said i’m okay, didn’t i?
Gotta go now. Have to get
home to my daughter.
Sistah, Sistah, Sistah, i’m not
trying to interfere. But how
you makin out? Heard
you wuz sick
i’m fine i said just
fine didn’t i just
say i’m fine. I’m okay
i’m standing here talkin
to you ain’t i?
I know but how you really
doing really feeling really
getting along. i want to help
heard you wuz real sick
allright. I’m hanging in
there standing up sitting down
spaced out scared talkin
silent laughing screaming
screaming screaming
legs hurt body hurt
eyes hurt chest hurt when
i cough all nite
don’t sleep a lot
sweat all night long
body wrapped in wet sheets
that’s how i am you know
and i call on my Gods
to help me through the nite
oya olukun oya olukun oya
sistah. I want ya to
know that i’m i’m i’m i’m
I ammmmmm here
and until i pass over
you will see me
walkin talkin lovin
prayin organizin bein
cuz i ammmmmmm
the universe knows that
i ammmmmmm
hiv positive but i ammmm
still. woman. lover. mother.
sistah. artist. organizer. activist.
woman
i say you will remember me
my life and my love
becuz i ammmmmmm a woman
soy mujer
mujer soy
i am.
FOR TUPAC AMARU SHAKUR
who goes there? who is this young man born lonely?
who walks there? who goes toward death
whistling through the water
without his chorus? without his posse? without his song?
it is autumn now
in me autumn grieves
in this carved gold of shifting faces
my eyes confess to the fatigue of living.
i ask: does the morning weep for the dead?
i ask: were the bullets conscious atoms entering his chest?
i ask: did you see the light anointing his life?
the day i heard the sound of your death, my brother
i walked outside in the park
we your mothers wanted to see you safely home.
i remembered the poems in your mother’s eyes as she
panther-laced warred against the state;
the day you became dust again
we your mothers held up your face green with laughter
and i saw you a child again outside your mother’s womb
picking up the harsh handbook of Black life;
the day you passed into our ancestral rivers,
we your mothers listened for your intoxicating voice:
and i heard you sing of tunes bent back in a
cold curse against black
against black (get back)
against black (get back)
we anoint your life
in this absence
we anoint our tongues
with your magic. your genius.
casual warrior of sound
rebelling against humiliation
ayyee—ayyee—ayyee—
i’m going to save these young niggaz
because nobody else want to save them.
nobody ever came to save me….
your life is still warm
on my breath, brother Tupac
Amaru Shakur
and each morning as i
pray for our people
navigating around these
earth pornographers
and each morning when
i see the blue tint of
our Blackness in the
morning dawn
i will call out to you again:
where is that young man born lonely?
and the ancestors’ voices will reply:
he is home tattooing his skin with
white butterflies.
and the ancestors will say:
he is traveling with the laughter of trees
his reptilian eyes opening between the blue spaces.
and the ancestors will say:
why do you send all the blessed ones home early?
and the ancestors will say:
you people
. Black. lost in the memory of silence.
look up at your children
joined at the spine with death and life.
listen to their genius in a season of dry rain.
listen to them chasing life falling
down getting up in this
house of blue mourning birds.
listen.
& he says: i ain’t mad at ya
& we say: so dont cha be mad at yo self
& he says: me against the world
& we say: all of us against the world
& he says: keep yo head up
& we say: yeah family keep yo head up every day
& he says: dear mama, i love you
& we say: dear all the mamas we love you too
& he says: all eyez on me
& we say: kai fi African (come here African)
all eyez on ya from the beginning of time
from the beginning of time
resist.
resist.
resist.
can you say it? resist. resist. resist.
can you say it? resist. resist. resist.
i say. can you do it? resist. resist. resist.
can you rub it into yo sockets? bones?
can you tattoo it on yo body?
so that you see. feel it strengthening you
as you cough blood before the world.
yeah. that’s right. write it on your
forehead so you see yourselves as you walk past tomorrow
on your breasts so when
your babies suckle you, when your man woman
taste you they drink the milk of resistance. hee hee hee
take it inside you so when your lover. friend.
companion. enters you they are covered
with the juices, the sweet
cream of resistance. hee hee hee
make everyone who touches this mother lode
a lover of the idea of resistance.
can you say it? RESIST.
can you say it? RESIST.
til it’s inside you and you resist