A Study of Pink Eye
the first party i ever missed
was in my own dorm. out my window,
i could hear the gutter swallow
the sway and the rain, leaking jazz was
all my left eye could manage
~
the last time i cried,
control was all i could think of.
how soil waits for sky to give, how
sky waits for exodus, how bodies
wait for warmth to come,
the ceaseless buffering
~
when the tears come
you shouldn’t invite them to stay
~
squatter’s rights is a strange concept.
take, for example, my legs
in this room bursting with exits.
when it is time to leave,
i am a rebel without a sense
of direction i bump into
every wall and call
whatever stops me
home.
~
my roommate, walking up
the flight of stairs, tells me
the party ran short
and i still do not forgive
my legs, as if it is too much
pressure to see warmth
and blink contagion
~
all that night
i could feel the bass against
my desk. i shook it off,
read my prescription
and a pinned tab on the
health benefits of crying.
i am a heightened fog of symptoms.
~
when the tears come
you shouldn’t invite them to stay
~
take, for example, my eyes
in this bed billowing with genesis.
when it is time to leave,
i am a sky with no body
to provide for, still
buffering at every chance
to give and calling
whatever takes this cycle
soil.
~
a week later, my mother calls me,
asks me if the medicine is working
i laugh, say yeah it is
she laugh, say i thought so
i ask, why you’d think that?
she say i can tell by your voice,
it must’ve cleared up.
say
now i can hear the rain outside.
Ode to Brown Sugar, or My Mother Says The Best Way to Hold Someone is With All of Your Being
and i think about love, how at its best it is thick, quake budding
until i spoon it brusquely.
i’ve just noticed the harvest
of my hands the last few months,
its loyal glean, the soft shake
to settle my ripe diligence.
i suppose it is only right
that i tell you i am thinking
of only listening to the melody of
black women from now on.
she says you must not let fickle
be your give and take
and i think about reflex, how at its best it is sharp, without a substitute
at breakfast i dwell
in this, eclipse a detour.
before she continues,
the d’angelo tune i want
some of your brown sugar
thrums through the stereo
and i see her pause
and of course i raise him
the beauty of layaway, how
love always plays hard to get,
bet anticipation moonwalks
up this utensil, makes my index
tremble, next synapse be alive,
be tentative,
be instigator that beats me,
be reason for prayer but not only.
and i think about my heart, how at its best it can take it, but not my astigmatism
i’ve never witnessed a man
ready for granular volume,
the lifted dulcet, would ever
derive sweet from simple from
there she shows me a clip of
the wedding
and the first dance
and the pseudo speed limit
and the vows that could sprout from my palms
and the advent for a chocolate neck i would kiss
and suddenly i can break down all these enzymes at once
and suddenly she is not my mother
but a black woman that has never been held
the way that video best holds her warmth
and suddenly music can not hold the room nor her
and suddenly i am an oasis of acoustics
and i think about metabolism, how at its best it is renewed without an end to await
