My poetry is exacting a confession From me: I will not keep the truth from my song. The voice undressed by the bees; I will not bar the voice undressed by the bees From entering the gourd of my bow-harp. I will not wash the blood off the image; I will let it flow from the gullet Slit by the assassin’s dagger through The run-on line until it rages in the verbs of terror; And I will distil life into the horrible adjectives. I will not clean the poem to impress the tyrant; I will not bend my verses into the bow of a praise song. I will put the symbols of murder hidden in high offices In the center of my crude lines of accusations. I will undress our land and expose her wounds. I will pierce the silence around our land with sharp metaphors, And I will point the light of my poems into the dark Nooks where our people are pounded to pulp. I will not coat my words with lumps of sugar But serve them to our people with the bitter quinine. I will not keep the truth from my heartstringed guitar; I will thread the voice from the broken lips Through my volatile verbs that burn the lies. I will ask only that the poem watch the world closely; I will ask only that the image put a lamp on the dark Ceiling in the dark sky of my land and light the dirt. Today, my poetry has exacted a confession from me.
Posted on: Wed, 31 Jul 2013 20:50:07 +0000