Nat Turner Returns for His Stolen Parts and Finds a Sermon of Rage

Nat Turner makes the slow trek through

the attics of America.  He wishes

to pull himself together. He knocks on doors.

And the ones who answer clutch his parts like charms.

And the ones who answer call him “apparition,”

“ghost,” “spook.”  No matter. Nights,

he creeps between the sutures of history

and takes himself back.  Nat Turner walks

through America. He meets a black man.

Hey man, “How does your rage fare?”

The man says, “My rage is as coy

as public impotence

as long and blunt as a billystick

as black as a cruiser

as careless as a traffic stop

as pale and slender as hand rolled cigarettes

as real as toy guns

as bloody as blood

on a white t-shirt

in the front seat of a paid off hearse.”

Nat Turner walks tall through America.

He meets a black woman.  “Sister,” he says,”

“How does your rage fare?”

“My rage,” she says, “Is a dragging by the hair,

a fissure in the head, a shuttered eye, a city-wide lie, Lord,

a you shalt not, a page five story, a that’s my baby,

a bomb unmoored.

My rage is dead girl smiling

a dead boy sagging, a dead man breathing,

a dead woman swinging.

It’s as nimble, Lord, as a sassy tongue.”

Nat Turner lifts his eyes to the hills.

The whole of him is avenging angel.

He absolves the wicked and blind with his sword.

“Lord,” he prays, “Lord, Lord, Lord

build a hedge of protection so high

we can’t see a thing but our rage.

Let rage keeps us woke all night

and all day.  Let us sharpen our daggers

on its whetstone. Let us lower our blades

again and again for mercy and love.

Our rage, yes Lord, our rage

more powerful than despair,

able to leap tall headstones

for generations.

Hallelujah.

Amen.”

What if the Supreme Court Were Really the Supremes?

Oh, how their bedazzled robes glisten

as they glide into the courtroom,

open wide their satin-gloved arms, flutter

their long, store-bought eyelashes

and croon, “My world is empty without you, babe.”

Even Cindy Birdsong envies their hips

as they pop and sway, dip and snap.

Each one a lady.

Would these judges made new

by the rhythm and the blues,

the ooh, ooh baby magic of a Motown spell,

ever hold the sequined fish of my voting rights

above their lovely bouffant heads,

tip its iridescent scales toward the camera,

then gut it, like a dinner trout?

When Prince Comes Back From Heaven

You will sing to me Raspberry Beret.

I will be wearing one. Just like I did

when I sat in the fourth row in love

with you and the man who held my hand.

I gave that man his hand back,

but you are still my boy. Come back,

my charming one. And yes,

I will ride with you anywhere. And yes,

wear the Afro and the purple suit.

Leave the platforms

with your insatiable mother.

Your father will feed the doves.