There was a mother. She had a child. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She raised a child. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She bore a child. She bore a second child. She held the first child, and she
held the second child. She watched them grow. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She was shucked like an oyster. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She dug in the earth. She washed little feet. She braided hair. She cupped
small faces in her palms. She packed snacks. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She worked. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She was tired. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She woke up. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She was bored at the playground. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She had children. She gave them the ripest fruit, leaving none for herself.
She loved her life.

There was a mother. She had children. She re-drew herself. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She was carried forward like sand. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She had a child. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She did back-of-the envelope calculations. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She filled out forms. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She glinted like the ocean. She loved her life.

There was a mother. She surfaced like wood. She loved her life.

There was a mother. They were wrong. She loved her life.

There was a mother.

A mother.

A mother.

A mother.

A mother.

A mother.

She loved her life.

Yes, I believe in fairies.
I believe in brownies too.
Yes, I believe in fairies,
Because I know they’re true.
And if you’ll learn to love them,
They’ll come and play with you.

The sky has put her bluest garment on,
    And gently brushed the snowy clouds away;
The robin trills a sweeter melody,
    Because you are just one year old today.

The wind remembers, in his sweet refrains,
    Away, away up in the tossing trees,
That you came in the world a year ago,
    And earth is filled with pleasant harmonies,

            And all things seem to say,
            “Just one year old today.”

Reverend Walter Peters, All Angels’ Church, November 18, 1849

Someone has died, who will never see the black
joylight expand in her mother’s blue eyes.
Who will never grasp a pinky, nor be danced
up, down and around and lullabied all night.
Someone who will never come to realize
that her Dada’s palms aren’t dirty, they’re just brown.
Who made HER mother, HIM father, then broke their hearts.
Who is their shooting star, glimpsed only once.
Someone who will never laugh, or play, or care …

Praying that little box into the earth,
Rev. Peters asks forgiveness for his faint faith.
He thinks of the life of pain Someone was spared.

“A female still born child of Egbert Stairs (colored) & Catherine Cochran his wife (white) was buried in All Angels’ churchyard, November 18, 1849”—from the church record.

^{Dedicated to the Poet Agostinho Neto,
President of The People’s Republic of Angola: 1976}

1
I will no longer lightly walk behind
a one of you who fear me:
                                     Be afraid.
I plan to give you reasons for your jumpy fits
and facial tics
I will not walk politely on the pavements anymore
and this is dedicated in particular
to those who hear my footsteps
or the insubstantial rattling of my grocery
cart
then turn around
see me
and hurry on
away from this impressive terror I must be:
I plan to blossom bloody on an afternoon
surrounded by my comrades singing
terrible revenge in merciless
accelerating
rhythms
But
I have watched a blind man studying his face.
I have set the table in the evening and sat down
to eat the news.
Regularly
I have gone to sleep.
There is no one to forgive me.
The dead do not give a damn.
I live like a lover
who drops her dime into the phone
just as the subway shakes into the station
wasting her message
canceling the question of her call:
fulminating or forgetful but late
and always after the fact that could save or 
condemn me

I must become the action of my fate.

2
How many of my brothers and my sisters
will they kill
before I teach myself
retaliation?
Shall we pick a number? 
South Africa for instance:
do we agree that more than ten thousand
in less than a year but that less than
five thousand slaughtered in more than six
months will
WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH ME?

I must become a menace to my enemies.

3
And if I 
if I ever let you slide
who should be extirpated from my universe
who should be cauterized from earth
completely
(lawandorder jerkoffs of the first the
                   terrorist degree)
then let my body fail my soul
in its bedeviled lecheries

And if I 
if I ever let love go
because the hatred and the whisperings
become a phantom dictate I o-
bey in lieu of impulse and realities
(the blossoming flamingos of my
                   wild mimosa trees)
then let love freeze me
out.
I must become
I must become a menace to my enemies.

Believe me a thistle will do
away with your hunger
for lush branches
and tacky color

Not the abstracted greens
of surrender oh daughter
of our family follow the flower
that evades capture fades
into pixel pricks the prying
eyes of unmanned hunters

I wished him
throughout my life

Oh daughter focus
learn the work song
of smaller creatures
this forest of branches
      is your inheritance
can you name
                  every twig
will you touch
                  every leaf
with bare hands
let your hair dance
as you blend into shrub
     and rock
dry is the land
that holds you

Can you hear the familiar pitch
of olive harvest the old tune
of older farmers gathered
for processions yet to come
a voice of closeness
to the earth

The hand that claps is the hand
that kneads is the hand that dances
repeated gestures on and off the tongue
red aprons golden bracelets
we are quick to break
into song

Half an egg in a pool of oil
the sun faces up our dough
will be moist the horizon hesitates
won’t admit to rough angles with
the color purple to slanted sunsets
beyond forbidden shores did you
capture the thistle twice

I wished him
from the branch of a tree

The song breaks

A landscape returns