In South Philadelphia the b-ball hoops
in the playgrounds and parks mostly had no nets,
no nets on the rims—they’d been stolen
or ripped down after being torn by leaping teenagers.
When my son was a boy the difference mattered
because he loved basketball, he loved the Sixers,
he loved shooting baskets and there is beautiful satisfaction
when a good shot falls through the net—
“Swish” we said—“Nothin’ but net”—
and so as I moved around town I always noticed
where the hoops had nets
so Nick and I could shoot there.

The difference mattered.  Life should be a certain way
but often the right way becomes unavailable—
the nets disappear—you have to be alert
to find the courts where a perfect shot really does go
swish.  Life has disappointments
but you don’t want your boy to feel that life is
mainly or mostly disappointing
or that the Sixers on TV are absurdly far from his real life—

because he needs to believe
that life allows moments of sublimity—swish—

so even now when Nick is almost forty
wherever I see good intact nets on the rims
I make a mental note for half a second:
Nick and I could play here.
The difference matters.

^{—after Beenie Man and Derek Walcott}

who am i?
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m the cramped quarters
            of any vessel voyaging the sea
            with contraband and trafficked cargo
who am i?
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m the rum barrel hollowed out
            and beaten into percussion
who am i?
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m a pidgin picking its way
            into a creole—any savage tongue
            consumed again and again
            until it can be repeated
who am i? 
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m the plátano deep frying sweet
            in oil or i’m the plátano fry-smash-
            fried into tostones
who am i?
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m the hibiscus steamed
            with ginger and sugar
            and allspice and clove
who am i?
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m a field song morphing
            out each new generation’s lips
who am i? 
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m the pilón smashing
            plátano and garlic and chicarrón
            into mofongo or i’m the pilón
            grinding allspice and clove
            and fennel and cinnamon into a jerk
who am i? 
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m this tripped-up tongue
            tryna wind its way through
            english, spanish, and patois
            smashed and ground-up together
who am i? 
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m sugarcane fields burnt or i’m
            the the scotch bonnet burn
            in the curry chicken or
            i’m the ron añejo burning
            its way down the throat
who am i? 
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m a poco man jam
            morphing into a dembow
who am i? 
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m the poems chanted
            over and over on the slave ship
            until they all mishmash smashed
            into a whole new song
who am i?                   who am i?                   who am i?
            either i’m nobody or
            i’m all of the nations
            or i am no nation or i’m a
            singular, ephemeral nation—
            the one i sing into being with this
            savage tongue, the one that disappears
            as soon as the sound stops shaking
            in the ocean salt air

Yesterday it was still January and I drove home
and the roads were wet and the fields were wet
and a palette knife

had spread a slab of dark blue forestry across the hill.
A splashed white van appeared from a side road
then turned off and I drove on into the drab morning

which was mudded and plain and there was a kind of weary happiness
that nothing was trying to be anything much and nothing
was being suggested. I don’t know how else to explain

the calm of this grey wetness with hardly a glimmer of light or life,
only my car tyres swishing the lying water,
and the crows balanced and rocking on the windy lines.

^{After Amiri Baraka and Stefania Gomez}

Poems are bullshit unless they are broken 
like a horse, like a dog kicked in the ribs, 
Like your favorite toy that’s missing an arm.

Love can make you feel used.
I want the poem that limps back to me.
Poems should hurt like love,
like ice water on your teeth
like a massage to smooth out a cramped muscle.

Give me the poem that’s like leather.
Give me the poem that smells like gasoline.
I want a poem that is a warning,
a poem that makes me check to see
if I left the shotgun by the door,
a poem that’s a runny nose, a sneeze, a poem
that’s the moment the sky turns green.

will poetry change the world? no one asks
this about football, the thrill of watching or
playing. we get that nurses & doctors are
healers. no question that rabbis, priests, &

imams guide individuals & groups through
spiritual thickets. we don’t tell cooks to put
down their wooden spoons & go make a real
difference instead of a real soufflé. teachers

are honored for the learning they impart. so
let poets keep on exciting passion in them-
selves & others. don’t discourage us from our
efforts to diagnose the human heart or create

trail markers for those coming behind us on
this journey. trust me when i say that poetry
heals, guides, feeds, & enlivens. poetry may
not change the world, but might change you.

(Mather AFB, California, 1956)

When we play horses at recess, my name
is Moonlily and I’m a yearling mare.
We gallop circles around the playground,
whinnying, neighing, and shaking our manes.
We scrape the ground with scuffed saddle oxfords,
thunder around the little kids on swings
and seesaws, and around the boys’ ball games.
We’re sorrel, chestnut, buckskin, pinto, gray,
a herd in pastel dresses and white socks.
We’re self-named, untamed, untouched, unridden.
Our plains know no fences. We can smell spring.
The bell produces metamorphosis.
Still hot and flushed, we file back to our desks,
one bay in a room of palominos.

^{to Mary Rose}

Here is our little yard  

too small            for a pool  
or chickens   let alone 

a game of tag or touch 
football       Then 

again   this stub-  
born patch  

of crabgrass  is just 
big enough      to get down  

flat on our backs 
with eyes wide open    and face 

the whole gray sky  just 
as a good drizzle 

begins                   I know  
we’ve had a monsoon  

of grieving to do  
which is why  

I promise    to lie 
beside you  

for as long as you like  
or need  

We’ll let our elbows 
kiss     under the downpour  

until we’re soaked  
like two huge nets  
                    left  

beside the sea  
whose heavy old

ropes strain  
stout with fish 

If we had to     we could  
feed a multitude  

with our sorrows  
If we had to  

we could name   a loss  
for every other  

drop of rain   All these  
foreign flowers 

you plant from pot  
to plot  

with muddy fingers  
—passion, jasmine, tuberose—  

we’ll sip 
the dew from them  

My darling                here
is the door I promised  

Here
is our broken bowl Here  

                        my hands  
In the home of our dreams  

the windows open  
in every  

weather—doused  
or dry—May we never  

be so parched 

To be a good
ex/current friend for R. To be one last

inspired way to get back at R. To be relationship
advice for L. To be advice

for my mother. To be a more comfortable
hospital bed for my mother. To be

no more hospital beds. To be, in my spare time,
America for my uncle, who wants to be China

for me. To be a country of trafficless roads
& a sports car for my aunt, who likes to go

fast. To be a cyclone
of laughter when my parents say

their new coworker is like that, they can tell
because he wears pink socks, see, you don’t, so you can’t,

can’t be one of them. To be the one
my parents raised me to be—

a season from the planet
of planet-sized storms.

To be a backpack of PB&J & every
thing I know, for my brothers, who are becoming

their own storms. To be, for me, nobody,
homebody, body in bed watching TV. To go 2D

& be a painting, an amateur’s hilltop & stars,
simple decoration for the new apartment

with you. To be close, J.,
to everything that is close to you—

blue blanket, red cup, green shoes
with pink laces.

To be the blue & the red.
The green, the hot pink.

If every bomb 
Appeared in the sky a dove
Shrapnel into rain

If vengeance vanquished 
From the cursed lips of weak men
An idea never taking root

If every tank vanished
If by chance a miracle
Peace reclaims the land

If laughter broke out
Like wars fought with satire’s
Pugilist punning 

What room would there be
For anger what bitter root
Not allowed to stretch

Its tentacles 
Through the hearts of men hardened
By indifference 

What will we bequeath 
Our children if not a world
Evermore human

Easy as an exquisite corpse paraphrased 
as dictionaried as a pontificator

raised by the thump of the 146 bus— 
these 16 are for you. Shout out

to the city warblers yelling in slanted 
syllables on avenues porous

with ill-built adornments & horse-riding 
monuments. These 16 are for you:

linebreakers & trash talkers, polysyllabic 
halfsteppers ready to mom’s spaghetti

their one opportunity. Meanwhile, 
the rooftop across from us undercuts

the sunsetted skyline & is topped with 
two metric heretics dressed

like crows. Another bullheaded poet 
ina Bulls hat rests his elbows

on the bench back & wonders if 
it is his hoarse verse or the verbed

streetlights making ellipsis from 
the veritable trees & inevitable breezes.