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I see into them as they see out of me & dissolve the wattage to avoid future legends young pharaohs on Fillmore cracking dutches it is a lonely frontier by contrast forgotten game skulking around big hearts, small temper thine absence overflows thine presence undoes do not attempt to circle the inferno a tremor in the throne is a tremor in the throne

Who needs to be at peace in the world? It helps to be between wars, to die a  few  times  each day to understand your father's sky, as you take it apart piece  by  piece  and can't feel  anything,  can't  feel the tree growing under your feet, the eyes poking night only to find another night to compare it to. Whoever   heard   of   turning   pain   into   hummingbirds   or   red  birds— haven't  we  grown?  What  does  it mean to be older?  Maybe a house with- out  doors  can  still  survive  a  storm. Maybe I can't find the proper way to rebel  or  damn it,  I can't  leave.  I want to,  but you grow inside of me. And as  I  watch   you,  before  I  know  it,  I'm  too  heavy,  too full  of  you  to  move. Maybe  that's what they meant when they said you shouldn't love a country too much.

We used to like talking about grief Our journals and letters were packed with losses, complaints, and sorrows. Even if there was no grief we wouldn’t stop lamenting as though longing for the charm of a distressed face. Then we couldn’t help expressing grief So many things descended without warning: labor wasted, loves lost, houses gone, marriages broken, friends estranged, ambitions worn away by immediate needs. Words lined up in our throats for a good whining. Grief seemed like an endless river— the only immortal flow of life. After losing a land and then giving up a tongue, we stopped talking of grief Smiles began to brighten our faces. We laugh a lot, at our own mess. Things become beautiful, even hailstones in the strawberry fields.

We are not responsible for your lost or stolen relatives. We cannot guarantee your safety if you disobey our instructions. We do not endorse the causes or claims of people begging for handouts. We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone. Your ticket does not guarantee that we will honor your reservations. In order to facilitate our procedures, please limit your carrying on. Before taking off, please extinguish all smoldering resentments. If you cannot understand English, you will be moved out of the way. In the event of a loss, you’d better look out for yourself. Your insurance was cancelled because we can no longer handle your frightful claims. Our handlers lost your luggage and we are unable to find the key to your legal case. You were detained for interrogation because you fit the profile. You are not presumed to be innocent if the police have reason to suspect you are carrying a concealed wallet. It’s not our fault you were born wearing a gang color. It is not our obligation to inform you of your rights. Step aside, please, while our officer inspects your bad attitude. You have no rights we are bound to respect. Please remain calm, or we can’t be held responsible for what happens to you.

young Jesse Washington — even though you     on the wooden stick cross of fire bitten charred cut & burned        5 minute jury April 15, 1916    Waco, Texas shackled & dragged — lynched You live on Trayvon Martin face down red juice on the lawn clutching candy rushing home the hoodie the hoodie the prowler shooter said upside down shredded night because of you     you we march touch hands lean back leap forth against the melancholy face of tanks & militia    we move walk become we become           somehow Eric Garner we scribble your name sip your breath    now our breath cannot be choked off our skin cannot be flamed      totality cannot be cut off each wrist each bone cannot be chained to the abyss gnashing levers & polished killer sheets of steel we are remarkably loud not masked rough river colors that cannot be threaded back hear us Freddie Gray here                                         with us Jesse Washington Trayvon Martin Michel Brown the Black Body holy Eric Garner  all breath Holy we weep & sing as we write as we mobilize & march under the jubilant solar face

———A simple Child, That lightly draws its breath, And feels its life in every limb, What should it know of death? I met a little cottage Girl: She was eight years old, she said; Her hair was thick with many a curl That clustered round her head. She had a rustic, woodland air, And she was wildly clad: Her eyes were fair, and very fair; —Her beauty made me glad. “Sisters and brothers, little Maid, How many may you be?” “How many? Seven in all,” she said, And wondering looked at me. “And where are they? I pray you tell.” She answered, “Seven are we; And two of us at Conway dwell, And two are gone to sea. “Two of us in the church-yard lie, My sister and my brother; And, in the church-yard cottage, I Dwell near them with my mother.” “You say that two at Conway dwell, And two are gone to sea, Yet ye are seven! I pray you tell, Sweet Maid, how this may be.” Then did the little Maid reply, “Seven boys and girls are we; Two of us in the church-yard lie, Beneath the church-yard tree.” “You run about, my little Maid, Your limbs they are alive; If two are in the church-yard laid, Then ye are only five.” “Their graves are green, they may be seen,” The little Maid replied, “Twelve steps or more from my mother’s door, And they are side by side. “My stockings there I often knit, My kerchief there I hem; And there upon the ground I sit, And sing a song to them. “And often after sun-set, Sir, When it is light and fair, I take my little porringer, And eat my supper there. “The first that died was sister Jane; In bed she moaning lay, Till God released her of her pain; And then she went away. “So in the church-yard she was laid; And, when the grass was dry, Together round her grave we played, My brother John and I. “And when the ground was white with snow, And I could run and slide, My brother John was forced to go, And he lies by her side.” “How many are you, then,” said I, “If they two are in heaven?” Quick was the little Maid’s reply, “O Master! we are seven.” “But they are dead; those two are dead! Their spirits are in heaven!” ’Twas throwing words away; for still The little Maid would have her will, And said, “Nay, we are seven!”

We are the knife people, iron men, coat people and he-lands-sailing. Souse eaters, house makers, husbands of kine and goat and swine, farm builders and keepers of kettle and scummer, word scratchers, corn stealers and bad sleepers. As if towns could build themselves. As if stumps jumped from the ground or flesh of beasts fell into trenchers. As if paradise prevailed on earth. To come to rich moulds and lush plantings, long-necked trees and tongues of land, to redd the wild for the unborn. To reck not the peril. Suffering snakes that may fly, wolves that may ravish. Kingdom of sachem and sagamore. Kingdom of corn and thorny promise. To satisfy our appetite of spirit, our thirst of property. To seek not the opera of war but belittled by the possibilities to stand silenced by the task before us— these be my sudden and undigested thoughts.

dine on disco balls and starfish, our jowls crashing like cymbals, while my baby brother takes out his eight-ball left eye and squints his right to line up his shot on the world’s smallest pool table. Mother has a camera for a head; it flashes uncontrollably though she claims to have run out of film a hundred years ago, when father’s penis, an unstoppable spigot, became a garden sprinkler, contained by adult diapers, changed hourly, and hourly, my sister— shuffling out of her hiding place in the cuckoo clock, her hair a mess of paper clips, a Raggedy Ann doll in her arms—sighs to pass the time. Water seeps through the ceiling, because upstairs the bathtub overflows, for Grandma has forgotten the bath she’s drawn, and on the stove the gas is high, the flames are heating up a pudding over which my opa whispers: boil, boil, loyal rubble, follow me to the end of my life.

My heart is a fancy place Where giant reddish-purple cauliflowers & white ones in French & English are outside Waiting to welcome you to a boat Over the low black river for a big dinner There's alot of choice among the foods Even a tortured lamb served in pieces En croute on a plate so hot as a rack Of clouds blown over the cold filthy river We are entitled to see anytime while we Use the tablecovers to love each other Publicly dishing out imitative luxuries To show off poetry's extreme generosity Then home in the heart of a big limousine

the difference between a cigarette holder and cigarette case, the pleasure of a lorgnette over spectacles, of a fortnight over two weeks, of a spiral over graduated stairs, of the frisson of crying like pouty boys, and of the way to walk a lobster on a leash: drag it, its exoskeleton rapping on the cobbles through the rabble of Montparnasse, as if lugging luggage. We did what could not gain us a week of rent or even a plate of fish, yet we managed to eat sickening amounts, to hate on our patroness, the Princess de Polignac, though, and I am sorry, she had bought us wine. Once, in the chamber before an evening concert, I hid a sack of bees in the white baby grand, and when ball-gowned Polignac raised the leaf they swarmed through the strings to the chandelier and the Princess saw a living sun and felt a little less dreary and a little less proud of being bored.