Lasana Sekou

(for shujah & joy)

This weathering caught us a cold this s’maatin day
rain us in from the reign outside
to face up the family find&foundry
& instead of the blare for dem so territory
& the bliss of we know ‘bandonmentality
it is home alone&altogether in aloneness we are home
& sudden so we gasp!
for true it is
that we have been gaping each other’s wounded sides
now not as foundlings in fetter
but as sift of eyelids&tongue-rows stuck out
as a latitude of fingers to
fist true it up the blood&water
flow in each hearth the john of truth:
children,
squirming gangly before we tek-up cross t’ bear
for the reaping of ours on earth,
behold thy mother.
mother, nation,
behold thy breed.
piddledover&drizzledon&downpoured&intermittent
wet-fouled&clouded in from the coldthis weathering
not just a wetness morning
not just washing settlements off receding flamboyant leaves
but weighty, like gall to pus down gut&drain

& whether ragless ancestral mourning was what it was,
unchained blood unclaimed
where no doctored plantation can hail the dance of the
dunce welcome to slaveland withering/
i cannot tell
& whether it was indeed weather
to wrest the fête from status-seeking to arrest the faith
forwarding freedom fullness
i cannot know this
but where we are to be
when daylight come, midnight is dew into we skin
& we reach home
we will know this, South is our pole! North is our star*
& each reaching manly will&word&work&doudou&doing&
be the cause in the destine

How this weathering caught us so
reign us in from the rain outside
rain us in from the reign outside
to face up the family find&foundry
that is sure to breach&bust the teeth of grin
of past years in this s’maatin dey dissing
& only then comes the rapture of all hands raising. ring
to beam
forward&freedom&fullness
but this weathering caught us in this s’maatin
where dey casting lots of cold cash to coat the grave sight-
less dye
in red en-blanc-et-blauw we die
or recede
like flamboyant leaves in this same s’maatin day cause
we self knead a little insidetime&oldtalk&lastlaugh&
cook-up-love-up&reasoning&
outside be still.


this is for when we meet/in tomorrow then, here&there
whether weather or not
not foundling flesh pounds in dutchbarter&frenchbase
no font of tears at the frontiers
but further on/ clear eyes/ to see open, saw past moses
tablets of salt&fresh ponds from the find&foundry
the tally hoe tongue of legba
the touched feather of liberty
the coming coming home
where we are to be
wholly the sweet land
salt of pond cradle depths in plunged sea
birth of shed blood
offer up to own sovereign sky
bare-breast tongues unto bare-chest sun
loaves of those black things in the upper corner
chamber room)

the banner waves/stir/the gail
the awaken/ follow the rain …

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Sekou, Lasana M. The Salt Reaper: Poems from the Flats. House of Nehesi Publishers, 2004.