like the beginnings - o odales o adagios - of islands
from under the clouds where I write the first poem
its brown warmth now that we recognize them
even from this thunder’s distance
still w/out sound. so much hope
now around the heart of lightning that I begin to weep
w/such happiness of familiar landscap
such genius of colour. shape of bay. headland
the dark moors of the mountain
ranges. a door opening in the sky
right down into these new blues & sleeping yellows
greens - like a mother’s
embrace like a lover’s
enclosure. like schools
of fish migrating towards homeland. into the bright
light of xpectation. birth
of these long roads along the edge of Eleuthera,
now sinking into its memory behind us
Section 11 from “Guanahani,” from Born to Slow Horses by Kamau Brathwaite. © 2005 by Kamau Brathwaite. Used by permission of Wesleyan University Press.