Shake Loose My Skin by Sonia Sanchez Read Free Book Online Page B

festival requested me
    not my child, your sister. your mother could not frame
    herself as her mother and i absentee
    father, and i nightclub owner carefree
    did not heed her blood, did not see my girl’s eyes
    shaved buckled down with southern thighs.
     
    now my seventy-eight years urge me on your land
now my predator legs prey, broadcast
no new nightmares no longer birdman
of cornerstone comes, i come to collapse the past
while bonfires burn up your orphan’s mask
i sing a dirge of lost black southern manhood
this harlem man begging pardon, secreting old.
     
    i was told i don’t remember who
    i think i was told he entered his sister’s house
    cursed me anew, tried to tattoo
    her tongue with worms, tried to arouse
    her slumbering veins to espouse
    his venom and she leaned slapped him still
    stilled his mouth across early morning chill.
     
    rumor has it that he slapped her hard
    down purgatorial sounds of caress
    rumor has it that he rushed her down a boulevard
    of mad laughter while his hands grabbed harness—
    like her arms and she, avenger and she heiress
    to naked lightning, detonated him, began her dance
    of looted hems gathering together for his inheritance.
     
    blood the sound of blood paddling down the road
    blood the taste of blood choking their eyes
    and my son’s body blood-stained red
    with country-lies, city-lies, father-lies, mother-lies,
    and my daughter clamoring to exorcise
    old thieves trespassing in an old refrain
    conjured up a blue-black chord to ordain.
     
    wa ma ne ho mene so oo
oseee yei, oseee yei, oseee yei
wa ma ne ho mene so oo
    he has become holy as he walks toward daresay
can you hear his blood tissue ready to pray
he who wore death discourages any plague
he who was an orphan now recollects his legs.
    wa ma ne ho mene so oo:
he is arising in all his majesty
oseee yei:
a shout of praise



Dancing
    i dreamt i was tangoing with
    you, you held me so close
    we were like the singing coming off the drums.
    you made me squeeze muscles
    lean back on the sound
    of corpuscles sliding in blood.
    i heard my thighs singing.

Haiku
    (for you)
    love between us is
    speech and breath. loving you is
    a long river running.

Tanka
    i thought about you
the pain of not having
you cruising my bones.
no morning saliva smiles this
frantic fugue about no you.

Blues Haiku
    let me be yo wil
derness let me be yo wind
blowing you all day.

Blues Haiku
    am i yo philly
    outpost? man when you sail in
to my house, you docked.

Haiku
    my womb is a dance
of leaves sweating swift winds
i laugh with guitars.

Love Poem
    (for Tupac)
    1.
    we smell the
wounds hear the
red vowels
from your tongue.
    the old ones
say we don’t
die we are
just passing
through into
another space.
    i say they
have tried to
cut out your
heart and eat
it slowly.
    we stretch our
ears to hear
your blood young
warrior.
    2.
    where are your fathers?
i see your mothers gathering
around your wounds folding
your arms shutting
your eyes wrapping you in prayer.
    where are the fathers?
zootsuited eyes dancing
their days away.
what have they taught you
about power and peace.
    where are the fathers
    strutting their furlined
    intellect bowing their
    faces in the crotch
    of academia and corporations
    burying their tongues
    in lunchtime pink
    and black pussies
    where are the fathers to teach
    beyond stayinschooluse
    acondomstrikewhilethe
    iron’shotkeephopealive.
    where have the fathers buried their voices?
    3.
    whose gold is carrying you home?
whose wealth is walking you through
this urban terror? whose greed
left you shipwrecked with golden
eyes staring in sudden death?
    4.
    you were in
a place hot
at the edge
of our minds.
you were in
a new world
a country
pushing with
blk corpses
distinct with
paleness and
it swallowed
you whole.
    5.
    i will not
burp you up.
i hold you
close to my heart.



Mrs. Benita Jones Speaks
    Why?
    You asking me why I’m moving. You reporters are something else you know. Why do you think? I was gonna tough it out. Thought all of this