EXILE
for Kwame Dawes
Your scuttled pays floats -- fiery -- in the ether;
Blazing, it vomits smudge-smoke. Your mind chars
Black because you yaw –- moth-like -– too near flames.
You douse your dream-scorched brain with slave-sweat rum --
The only gold you can own, corroding
Your liver. Your anthem plays to gunfire.
When you think about it (when you can breathe) –-
After all the lies that frame nostalgia,
All the dead faces that occupy photographs,
All the slain lovers pitched into ditches,
Your eyes itch and ache with water, then dry –-
Curling like dead leaves, starving for gold fire.
for Kwame Dawes
Your scuttled pays floats -- fiery -- in the ether;
Blazing, it vomits smudge-smoke. Your mind chars
Black because you yaw –- moth-like -– too near flames.
You douse your dream-scorched brain with slave-sweat rum --
The only gold you can own, corroding
Your liver. Your anthem plays to gunfire.
When you think about it (when you can breathe) –-
After all the lies that frame nostalgia,
All the dead faces that occupy photographs,
All the slain lovers pitched into ditches,
Your eyes itch and ache with water, then dry –-
Curling like dead leaves, starving for gold fire.