Africa's trees form circles on my fingernails, and leathery straps of stetsons are the cancerous hands of a man who knew me well. Who knew me best. I am indebted to the yellow placenta of goats. And the stringy essence of a cigar Between the lips of a country Cuban. Manuel. My dollar is in the palm of your gambling gamboling Stetson hands. And 12 years hence, tears still drop from eyes, Eyes with Havana carved into the filaments. Bath me in racism. Wash me with doom, And give me my grandmother's ring For safekeeping, Saferemembering, Safeloving. The sun is too warm for stickball in the fields. But you cut down my first Christmas tree, And for this, I am indebted To your pseudo-Latin memory. Lungs clasped in the hands of my youth, And IVs stuck into the temples Of your offerings. Please come home and save me From the retching of my father. From the complaints that my mother Files against me in the courts of castles long demolished by Imperialism. It is my land, after all, not yours To sell to the old jalopy down the gravel road. Not yours to paint with Cheap eyeshadow and go-go boots. Your lawsuit Brought about your own funeral, And my grief Will never be the same.
