So much scripts

Dear Babylon,

When mom fell in love with Dick Gregory I tightened   my  eyes   and   pictured  a sled  in   the  desert. Her in the sled. Me with the water. Voices like sheets of ice or edie sedgwick biting warhol’s neck til red soup commercial  showroom   warm with iodized salt.  I’m all about the sea catching slave bills on the walls of these museum mansions. I’m always the leader   the  one who casts   the heaping  net  of reckless judgment  to say   get   away    get  better   get  a  way I respect.  Heckle the mirror of yesterday into a confession.  Of what? What should it confess? This used to be a minstrel balcony before Eleanor Roosevelt read poetry from it, the sicilian tour guide reminds me of every failed hunt, every wild urge  Get it, gurl. I might have said, to the mother, lovingly repelled and counting melted freckles that amounted to wounded suns. How’d I get so ruthless? How’d the edge get this close? Chuck D said nobody is safe when he strangled William Buckley on that desert sled. I promise I rather be deserted than situated opposite a rehearsed pledge of human faithfulness. Stevie’s fulfillingness plays and balloons pop right on the sand, and pop mutiny,  righteous and shrill, I’m better than this,  I promise I’m better   than   this,  he  promises.  Don’t look at the eclipse don’t touch its sizzling driftless  scissor  burn. That      tolerance  is   reckless    haughty    upcycled    crest   of  lost or overworn   love.   I can’t   stand  the  way  she sucks  fruit    not  my mom   this other woman    meant   to  be  a friend    I can’t    stand   her  voice  on entering  a new   room   and the way  it pitches  up in search of attention and acceptance,   and anyone  who tries  to be cute, I can’t stand them.     And the man  I   love    I want   him  to   adjust  his shoulders    and become  Malcolm X or Miles before  he hit.  Tie around the elbow.  Me on my knees in front of him, not in supplication but  in supply  and demand and  aching oneness.    And as for  the framed bill of sale of a slaveboy called “Mink”  on the wall at this  castle   we toured   like   hungry  mice,  I can’t  stand us. Our  famine    our    dumb   hunger/   I’m  using my stomach muscles   to   sit   coldly   on the  hood  of   an   eagle   and  heal   my perfect   heart.   Here’s  where  I start   to stammer     here’s   where the plan  to murder   false intentions    arrived  at while  on my back  with legs  spread  in   happy  baby,    squeals  like  a  victim        I am not the victim  here      I know one thing from another    I can  soften   my    eyes   and  look   up                           I  can   ask  the five  men   pointing  to heaven  why   they killed  their  brother         but I know   they  think     by  now     for   love             I can   soften    my   eyes     I can   burn   the bible    while   I recite     it      I can be   that  unfussy    I can shrug  instead of boast  or  resist     but  I won’t    not  for nothin

Cedo / Dayglow / Dunham Isolations

Woke as when

Maafa to Herself

God talk now             I’ve   overtold the story  to this point and I’ve lost where it was       that we were   at   

 

   the   question             is   treacherous        you  up ?   banal allure  of  a trifling...   the   leather skin,     preternatural     whatever   history    we   have left  :   racks  on  racks   on    racks       as   yet        the   part  I    left  out  until   yesterday     the   sturdy   and   dazed   part  I  left  town   about       the part   where   she  held  my  carriage   my   crested bassinet  or dangled  it    above   moving   Sunset boulevard  traffic     screaming   fuck  you    at  every  passing      baffled    go    by     vehicle    and    sobbing           Maafa,  you come    all   the   far  way  back    from  chattanooga   for   that  slow    yellow   thrill     or     was    it   fast           to  the   point   where     by   the   time   we got   back   to the   car     and   she paused  with  unlocked   doors   to   check    the   map     the  two  bright  black  men   with    happy   guns  who  got  in    and drove us   around   yelling   how   come   you have these  black   babies    screaming   how   come    you   got these     frayed  saddles   for    saviors     you’ve    got  money?      you’ve  got money!       And   lifted   the  white  Chevy   out from under   us      those  beautiful  thieves   who  saved  our  souls     that    night       and  I   never    got   to  thank  them     or   sensed   the  tension   between   two   modes  of survival   that  their shy guns   and   me   and mom, she   drunker than  ever, us  huddled   on the sidewalk  outside  the police  station    gates     that  night         alleviated      There is  nothing    anyone     can     take    from      me      There  is nothing    I  can’t   have         But all   this  having   has  demanded equal  wanting        How  much  I must   have     wanted      a  bright  black   honor   in the front   seat    to  drive   us   on    home    that    evening    A safeplace  mistaken   for    rage      that   perfect    seeping      night       when   violence    wasn’t   a crime   but an  intervention    on    my behalf      a    mis   en  scene    angry   gods  sent  to save  us       There     is    nothing    anyone     can   take  from   me     There is  nothing   I can’t  have      They   went   to jail     they   ended   up   behind   bars     walking   muscular   circles    in   a  square    cage        I   wonder   if   they   remember        my   prayer    my   prayer    my  prayer     my  prayer     my    prayer     

Some orange sun