Spring Summer 2022
I have, may it please the court, a few words to say.
In the first place
I deny everything
but water
have all along
I quilted my designs
on a map, all stars
freed slaves
we upended
serpentry. Oh!
to have made
such lean patties
of fat masters
they froze last winter
we shook them down
with the trappings
of a jinn
Boats to either side
MOVE
slow
defend—we said No!
too rough
this country
Hands? Left them in Canada
Eyes? Divined to do the same
They never didn’t
intend murder
art
treason
order
corruption of progeny
or to excite
or incite
the enslaved to rebellion
We freed a mother tongue
abject in their ice and
it is unjust that ICE should sulfur
our ancestral dreams
Had I so interred fear in the path of the rich
the powerful
the intelligent
the so-called “patriot”
on behalf of any of their friends—
father, mother, sister, wife, children, or any of that class—
and suffered
and sacrificed what I have
for this interred fear
it would have been
purest flight
End every man in this court
either hand
punish
vent
