HE LOVED HIM MADLY

[In a Silent Way]

It had been watching you sleep in dreams of excrement

and hard voices. The government gifted it with mute,

unregulated hands. It came to you, father, before

I was born, my bones bound in the cup of your absence.

Your skin was peeled in a dominion of wolves.

[Illegal Business]

When it came it came wearing familial faces.

House after house, noses took in this new air.

A brother OD’d, a father, a mother, an uncle, a sister—

House after house cataracted with snow-veiled skulls.

On the corner, police officers licked their white fingers.

[Will O’ the Wisp]

I was four when I committed your face

to memory. I made into reason what was

once rumor. Diaspora, meaning this time

what father-source had left me pliant had

returned so that I could return and turn to it.

[Dead Presidents II]

Poverty gave reason to hustle. A dealer’s

frozen wrists, weighted by stones, flipped

through green pages of an anemic bible

that cataloged white men who once jeweled their own

properties in varicose coffles toward cotton coffins.

[Black Comedy]

Father, you were summarized by your veins’ laughter.

Last time I saw you your face was cratered

with breathless mouths collaborating with dust.

Behold the white horse, hoof over hoof

dispersing the circus of our communal horror.

[Ten Crack Commandments]

It’s offensive, our most brilliant forced to pray

to getting paid, forced to spray or get sprayed.

It got so bad folks was scraping and sniffing

the ash off their knees. Cities full of prophets

that could only see as far as their own decease.

[Inamorata]

Whom did you love most: Lady Caine, Mama Coca,

White Lady, Girlfriend, Lady Snow, Pearl,

Aunt Nora, Angie, Carrie Nation, Percia, Mujer,

Corrinne, Gift-of-the-Sun-God, Snow White, Her?

[Dope]

Cain’t be capitalism. No suh! No suh! u u u u u u u

Must be the Devil! Cain’t be white supremacy! No suh!

Couldn’ta been the Iran-ContraaffairandReaganlooking

underTOWmissilesforhostageswhileCIAbreaksloaves

ofcokealloverthisGodfearinland no suh! u u u u u owowoo!

[Sorcerer]

Father, I have sewn my eyes to an allegiance

with worms. I am still incredulous of light.

The city of my teeth has softened its curses.

If you arrived elemental, shapeless and aquiver,

I’d fashion you a suit from my hollow’s frame.

[C.R.E.A.M]

How much for the faux Bearden of a Lexus collaged

over a crack house, addicts clawing the air like trees?

When weight moves like poltergeists a triple beam

gets its wings, but not all caine is able.

[On the Corner]

The moon unbraids a man’s hair. His Solo Cup

of Jack Daniels catches light, shakes to the bass

rattle of speakers stacked on the porch like die.

His woman leans on his shoulder. When he kisses

her forehead he leaves a bouquet of stars.

[Street Dreams]

Her blunt unrolled itself on the floor. Its entrails rose

and configured like a burning church in reverse.

Then her grandpa’s voice: Baby, this ain’t no place

of worship. But she already had a messenger, had

already counted the buds blooming from her tongue.

[Recollections]

My father sang in Superior Movement. He would croon

around the house, the halls carrying his falsetto

like a good beast. In the store he gave me quarter

after quarter to play Pac-Man and Golden Axe.

He taught me to laugh at losing, how to run away fast.

[Let Me Roll]

Lung rider, smoke inscriber, your eyes spin white,

coaxed inward by black steers stomping loose

their hair to string your mind’s cavity into heirloom

and guitar. To you the air is erotic, is panic-stricken.

Your bloodshot eyes weave a nest to nest the haints.

[He Loved Him Madly]

Dear architect of rot. Dear razor that is your dead body

beneath my bare feet. Dear smile, endless, a lake

that keeps my reflection. Dear reflection I keep

in the locket of my closed eyes. Dear father.

Dear wish. Dear closest thing to God I know.