Jayne Cortez

Under the edge of february in hawk of a throat hidden by ravines of sweet oil by temples of switchblades beautiful in its sound of fertility beautiful in its turban of funeral crepe beautiful in its camouflage of grief in its solitude of bruises in its arson of alert Who will enter its beautiful calligraphy of blood Its beautiful mask of fish net mask of hubcaps mask of ice picks mask of watermelon rinds mask of umbilical cords changing into a mask of rubber bands Who will enter this beautiful beautiful mask of punctured bladders moving with a mask of chapsticks Compound of Hearts   Compound of Hearts Where is the lucky number for this shy love this top-heavy beauty bathed with charcoal water self-conscious against a mosaic of broken bottles broken locks   broken pipes   broken bloods of broken spirits broken through like broken promises Landlords  Junkies  Thieves enthroning themselves in you they burn up couches they burn down houses and infuse themselves against memory every thought a pavement of old belts every performance a ceremonial pickup how many more orphans  how many more neglected shrines how many stolen feet stolen fingers stolen watchbands of death in you how many times Harlem hidden by ravines of sweet oil by temples of switchblades beautiful in your sound of fertility beautiful in your turban of funeral crepe beautiful in your camouflage of grief in your solitude of bruises in your arson of alert beautiful

These New York City Pigeons cooing in the air shaft are responsible for me stubbing my toe spraining my ankle and getting sick on ammonia fumes That pigeon roosting on the clothesline stole my nightgown Those pigeons on the street lamp made me feel foolish while riding in a black car completely splattered with their grey & white poo poo These New York City pigeons are not calm like pigeons of Oxalá in Brazil and do not croon like doves of Zimbabwe New York City pigeons moan strange    low    mournful    quivering cancer-like moans mixed with hungry hyena barks & gulping loss of the forest cries New York City pigeons are not relaxed like pigeons sunning at Marcel Duchamp swimming pool in San Francisco New York City pigeons are not happy like pigeons standing on head of the woman selling bananas on a street corner in Johannesburg New York City pigeons flap viral leather fungus dust from wings into faces then sit on steps vocalizing & waiting for the death of humankind New York City pigeons are not friendly like pigeons eating flaky crescent-shaped rolls at Hotel du Piémont in Paris New York City pigeons are not content like pigeons posing for photos on arms of men in plaza of Caracas New York City pigeons will lounge on ledges & murmur profanity all day will fight for fucking space in the mating season shit on air conditioners & wipe their asses on windows while big cockroaches suck Sucrets in the dark New York City pigeons are not alert like pigeons sitting quietly on bicycles in peace memorial park of Hiroshima New York City pigeons roll their pearly eyes inflate their throats and defecate on the shoulders of pedestrians New York City pigeons have no love for crumb-throwing pigeon lovers & no year of the pigeon is celebrated at least not for these New York City Pigeons

My friend they don't care if you're an individualist a leftist  a rightist a shithead or a snake They will try to exploit you absorb you  confine you disconnect you  isolate you or kill you And you will disappear into your own rage into your own insanity into your own poverty into a word a phrase a slogan a cartoon and then ashes The ruling class will tell you that there is no ruling class as they organize their liberal supporters into white supremacist lynch mobs organize their children into ku klux klan gangs organize their police into killer cops organize their propaganda into a device to ossify us with angel dust preoccupy us with western symbols in african hair styles inoculate us with hate institutionalize us with ignorance hypnotize us with a monotonous sound designed to make us evade reality and stomp our lives away And we are programmed to self-destruct to fragment to get buried under covert intelligence operations of unintelligent committees impulsed toward death And there it is The enemies polishing their penises between oil wells at the pentagon the bulldozers leaping into demolition dances the old folks dying of starvation the informers wearing out shoes looking for crumbs the life blood of the earth almost dead in the greedy mouth of imperialism And my friend they don't care if you're an individualist a leftist  a rightist a shithead or a snake They will spray you with a virus of legionnaire's disease fill your nostrils with the swine flu of their arrogance stuff your body into a tampon of toxic shock syndrome try to pump all the resources of the world into their own veins and fly off into the wild blue yonder to pollute another planet And if we don't fight if we don't resist if we don't organize and unify and get the power to control our own lives Then we will wear the exaggerated look of captivity the stylized look of submission the bizarre look of suicide the dehumanized look of fear and the decomposed look of repression forever and ever and ever And there it is

Art what do the art suppressors care about art they jump on bandwagons wallow in press clips & stink up the planet with their pornographic oppression Art what do they care about art they go from being contemporary baby kissers to old time corrupt politicians to self-appointed censorship clerks who won't support art but will support war poverty lung cancer racism colonialism and toxic sludge that's their morality that's their religious conviction that's their protection of the public & contribution to family entertainment what do they care about art

When i blow open green bottles straight across hump of a frozen tongue when i shove brown glass through skull of a possum and pass from my ears a baptism of red piss when i cry from my butt like a jackal and throw limbs of a dying mule into the river when i spit venom from the head burn codeine into a cosmetic paste and grieve into a wax of dried bulls when my mystical bunions jam eyes into searching spit of a starving wolf into cosmic lips like monkey genitals And i receive my pickled turned skeleton of rusty chains in the bodega i receive a symbolic heart made of five middle fingers in the bodega i receive a teeth parade of yellow roses to leave the bodega and cross the rio grande onto the flatbead bones of a musty nighttrain I say to see me loosen jaws like a snake to see me exhausted after a few strikes to see me pay dirt to the ice hog in my masai-pachuca-doo squatting on a pillow of old zoot suits squatting among the names and breeds breaking down cheeks dotted on this night train and i say i dream of the 1943 riots I say i dream in a hailstorm of riots And i say riots dream into a mass of skins stooping on flatbed bones of a funky nighttrain And when i siphon sweat for fuel from this patron saint of chronic diarrhea When i turn this rubber face into a spotted puma and take on the forceful winds of the prune pickers When my laughter dominates the last seat And i burn labor contracts into brown port caca Then I approach in mother of pearl and human blood in father of smoking and coughing throats and in my jelly of coyote strings who is to say what when i approach I mean somewhere along the road in this cold cold chicken shit somewhere along the road in this wasted body somewhere along the road eat stocks, bonds feathers somewhere along the road confiscate borders from wild dogs somewhere along the road shove them into the imperial valley somewhere along the road cry hard and let this night train sink its rundown rectum of electric chairs into heaven and say fuck it I see a way through the maroon glass of this milky way I say i see a way through for the cradle of hulls sticking through these indigo ankles I see a way through for these torn shoes stinking like dead cats I see a way through for these blood-streaked legs I say i see a way through for these pus-riddled holes in their suction-cup lips and when i pass through toothless combs coming from armpits of the bodega when i pass through bats on corkscrews coming from the bodega when i push my mortified flesh from this bodega and walk with the mildew of an old zoot suit walk tall in my mud-packed-masai-pachuca-doo walk among the survivors from the musty nighttrains fuck it I say dreams are like riots i say we dream in a hailstorm of riots and I say riots dream into a mass of skins coming from flatbed bones of the funky funky nighttrains

Disguised in my mouth as a swampland nailed to my teeth like a rising sun you come out in the middle of fish-scales you bleed into gourds wrapped with red ants you syncopate the air with lungs like screams from yazoo like X-rated tongues and nickel-plated fingers of a raw ghost man and somewhere stripped like a whirlwind stripped for the shrine room you sing to me through the side face of a black rooster In the morning  in the morning  in the morning all over my door like a rooster in the morning  in the morning  in the morning And studded in my kidneys like perforated hiccups inflamed in my ribs like three hoops of thunder through a screw a star-bent-bolt of quivering colons you breathe into veiled rays and scented ice holes you fire the space like a flare of embalmed pigeons and palpitate with the worms and venom and wailing flanks and somewhere inside this fever inside this patinaed pubic and camouflaged slit stooped forward on fangs in rear of your face you shake to me in the full crown of a black rooster In the morning  in the morning  in the morning Masquerading in my horn like a river eclipsed to infantries of dentures  of diving spears you enter broken mirrors through fragmented pipe spit you pull into a shadow ring of magic jelly you wear the sacrificial blood of nightfall you lift the ceiling with my tropical slush dance you slide and tremble with the reputation of an earthquake and when i kick through walls to shine like silver when i shine like brass through crust in a compound when i shine  shine  shine you wail to me in the drum call of a black rooster In the morning  in the morning  in the morning gonna kill me a rooster in the morning early in the morning way down in the morning before the sun passes by in the morning  in the morning  in the morning In the morning when the deep sea goes through a dog's bite and you spit on the tip of your long knife In the morning in the morning when peroxide falls on a bed of broken glass and the sun rises like a polyester ball of menses in the morning gonna firedance in the petro in the morning turn loose the blues in the funky jungle in the morning I said when you see the morning coming like a two-headed twister let it blow  let it blow in the morning  in the morning all swollen up like an ocean in the morning early in the morning before the cream dries in the bushes in the morning when you hear the rooster cry cry rooster cry in the morning  in the morning I said disguised in my mouth like a swampland nailed to my teeth like a rising sun you come out in the middle of fish-scales you bleed into gourds wrapped with red ants you syncopate the air with lungs like screams from yazoo like X-rated tongues and nickel-plated fingers of a raw ghost man and somewhere stripped like a whirlwind stripped for the shrine room you sing to me through the side face of a black rooster In the morning  in the morning  in the morning

Don't ask me who I'm speaking for who I'm talking to why I'm doing what I do in the light of my existence You rise you spit you brush you drink you pee you shit you walk you run you work you eat you belch you sleep you dream & that's the way it is In the morning tap water tasted fishy coffee sits in its decaffeinated cup caca & incense have a floating romance & a stale washcloth will make you smell doubly stale so don't get kissed on the cheek don't get licked on the neck at 8 a.m. the trains & buses are packed with folks farting their bread & butter farts the gymnasium is dominated by the stench of hot tennis shoes & one in the locker room a few silly-talking intellectual-looking coke-drinking cloth-dropping paper-littering spinach-pooting smug arrogant women wait to be waited on & in another locker room there are odors of crotches & jock straps bengay, tiger balm & burning balls sweat socks & sweat suits of body-building door-slamming iron-pumping phlegm-hawking men all sour & steamy & wrapped up together in a swamp of butt-popping towels but don't let it get you down don't let it psych you up Outside the ledges are loaded with pigeons clouds are seeded with homeless people & lyricism of the afternoon in a sub-proletarian madman squatting & vomiting from his bowels a brown liquid of death in front of your house & it's not happening because of you those socks don't stink because of me a bureaucrat is not a jerk because of us I'm not this way because of them you're not that way because of me don't ask about influences You rise you spit you brush you drink you pee you shit you walk you run you work you eat you belch you sleep you dream & that's the way it is