In our infancy of action we were women of peace
come to service islands with no bridges in sight
in the beginning we all dreamed of an ending
but the wars of our childhood have aged us.
When donations of soup from my yesterday's kitchen
sour in the stomachs of beggars now miles away
and they toss in their sleep in doorways
with a curse of worry upon their lips
then even my good deeds are suspect
fulfillments of dreams of the dead
printing so many starvations
upon our future.
While we labor to feed the living
beware the spirit of the uneasy dead
who trap us into believing
in the too simple.
Our childhood wars have aged us
but it is the absence of change
which will destroy us
which has crippled our harvest into nightmare
of endless plowing through fields rank with death
while the carcasses of 4 million blackbirds
frozen to death because their chatter
insulted the generals
escape in the back pages
like the three black girls
hauled into an empty hurried courtroom
to point fingers at their mother—
I was cooking peasoup while they murmured—
“Yes, Mommy told us that she'd killed him
in front of many strangers she told us
yes he was a white man, may we go now?”
And their eyes look like old women who sleep
in the curve of neon doorways under newspaper
clutching a can of petfood for tomorrow's meal.
Sisters there is a hole in my heart
that is bearing your shapes
over and over
as I read only the headlines
of this morning's newspaper.