Singing Nigger
YOUR bony head, Jazbo, O dock walloper, Those grappling hooks, those wheelbarrow handlers, The dome and the wings of you, nigger, The red roof and the door of you, I know where your songs
Chords
IN the morning, a Sunday morning, shadows of sea and adumbrants of rock in her eyes… horseback in leather boots and leather gauntlets by the sea. In the evening, a Sunday evening, a rope
Clinton South of Polk
I WANDER down on Clinton street south of Polk And listen to the voices of Italian children quarreling. It is a cataract of coloratura And I could sleep to their musical threats and accusations.
Snow
SNOW took us away from the smoke valleys into white mountains, we saw velvet blue cows eating a vermillion grass and they gave us a pink milk. Snow changes our bones into fog streamers
Long Guns
THEN came, Oscar, the time of the guns. And there was no land for a man, no land for a country, Unless guns sprang up And spoke their language. The how of running the
In a Breath
To the Williamson Brothers HIGH noon. White sun flashes on the Michigan Avenue Asphalt. Drum of hoofs and whirr of motors. Women trapsing along in flimsy clothes catching Play of sun-fire to their skin
They Ask Each Other Where They Came From
AM I the river your white birds fly over? Are you the green valley my silver channels roam? The two of us a bowl of blue sky day time and a bowl of red
Timber Wings
THERE was a wild pigeon came often to Hinkley’s timber. Gray wings that wrote their loops and triangles on the walnuts and the hazel. There was a wild pigeon. There was a summer came
The Shovel Man
ON the street Slung on his shoulder is a handle half way across, Tied in a big knot on the scoop of cast iron Are the overalls faded from sun and rain in the
Illinois Farmer
BURY this old Illinois farmer with respect. He slept the Illinois nights of his life after days of work in Illinois cornfields. Now he goes on a long sleep. The wind he listened to
New Farm Tractor
The rear axles hold the kick of twenty Missouri jackasses. It is in the records of the patent office and the ads there is twenty horse power pull here. The farm boy says hello
Always the Mob
JESUS emptied the devils of one man into forty hogs and the hogs took the edge of a high rock and dropped off and down into the sea: a mob. The sheep on the
Under
I I AM the undertow Washing tides of power Battering the pillars Under your things of high law. II I am a sleepless Slowfaring eater, Maker of rust and rot In your bastioned fastenings,
Follies
Shaken, The blossoms of lilac, And shattered, The atoms of purple. Green dip the leaves, Darker the bark, Longer the shadows. Sheer lines of poplar Shimmer with masses of silver And down in a
Fight
RED drips from my chin where I have been eating. Not all the blood, nowhere near all, is wiped off my mouth. Clots of red mess my hair And the tiger, the buffalo, know