I keep on drying again. Veins collapse, opening like the Small fists of sleeping Children. Memory of old tombs,

Your hands easy weight, teasing the bees hived in my hair, your smile at th… slope of my cheek. On the occasion, you press

Give me your hand Make room for me to lead and follow you beyond this rage of poetry.

You may write me down in history With your bitter, twisted lies, You may trod me in the very dirt But still, like dust, I’ll rise. Does my sassiness upset you?

Shadows on the wall Noises down the hall Life doesn’t frighten me at all Bad dogs barking loud Big ghosts in a cloud

There are some nights when sleep plays coy, aloof and disdainful. And all the wiles that I employ to win

Funky blues Keen toed shoes High water pants Saddy night dance Red soda water

Beloved, In what other lives or lands Have I known your lips Your Hands Your Laughter brave

We were entwined in red rings Of blood and loneliness before The first snows fell Before muddy rivers seeded clouds Above a virgin forest, and

Your skin like dawn Mine like musk One paints the beginning of a certain end. The other, the end of a

FOR DAVID P—B The eye follows, the land Slips upward, creases down, forms The gentle buttocks of a young Giant. In the nestle,

I’ve got the children to tend The clothes to mend The floor to mop The food to shop Then the chicken to fry

The highway is full of big cars going nowhere fast And folks is smoking anything that… Some people wrap their lies around… And you sit wondering