Sunday, December 5, 2010

I wrote this to a friend, or something like it



every wooden man
has a galley full of slaves
rowing to the shores of their
future freedom
but not before their present bondage.

and here I spill out the sides

from the wicked man's perch
he hears
the negro spirituals condemning
him with their guttural harmony
flavored by the gasp of a woman
dead in child birth.

I am a wooden man
looking at Canaan on the horizon
propelled by my shackled brothers
and hatred of my port and bow
but a believer in their freedom
the death of my way of living
and the resurrection of other dead.

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