No Matter What Wind
genetic kinship with night
alert breathing relaxed into lung cry whisper
sweat trickle to blend with blood earth
a mystery old as mosaic tiles,
the new knowing
sound of hammer on nail beside quiet
sagely brick
the sun-baked
tombs of antiquity humming tones
the present scripted on walls of my skin
wonder if the price of gold will rise
who will buy a ring,
i dug to place
another meal for six mouths
who hears the gasp of surprise, the method of promise
the feeding trees of gathering crops
my son to university will be sent packing culture through customs
a me of us he will make in another world
his dancefloor step will electrocute electric boogie rookies
a decade of movement will father a walking continent
rumbling with the coarse belly truth
of falling forest and mining
echoes of birth
pregnant with sound his eyes wander on the otherside of glass
his music is never always struggle
his degrees dance with the harvest
steps
love is a language of progression
mirrors of water float where he will look to find
me
skipping in between
Kidjo, Fela, Miriam, the Call
eastward i’ve turned.
when i go he will remember
the food of our table
the play of our hands
the birds of our walks
the skinning of game
bowing toward the Earth to uplift prayer
in the morning he will
face his mountains
obedient
to the knowledge of his blood
unafraid of the currents of change
post-modernity, contemporary, neo-modern
he will stand in the spine of time
speak his language of beauty in the ears of children
a talking
drum of whole note power
no
matter what wind.
©Benjamin Theolonius Sanders (IQ)
March 12, 2008
6:33 p.m. @ The Brooks Museum of Art- Memphis, TN
"Snap Judgements Exhibition"