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of words of Death (for Jesse)
To use the word - Death - alone
is just that – alone and empty,
scratches on paper having no meaning.
To tell death’s tale, surround it with life
make it harsh and honest, sincere and genuine
Tell me of Death, but please, make it real
Show me death and pity-
show me the fourteen-year-old black youth
in a pool of blood
on the cold dirty concrete
at the bottom of his stoop
with his sister and his mother crying
clenching to each other
while crystal clear drops
of poverty and welfare
stream down their dirty faces.
Show me death and loneliness-
explain the scene of a nineteen-year-old
track star from Dubuque
sitting in a muddy hole hurriedly dug
in the fresh rich soil of a French farm field
of summer rye that waves in the late-spring breeze
while his red-headed, pig-tailed
high-school sweet heart
writes him love poems
in his absence and in her own anticipation
as he lies cold, scared and so alone
watching an even younger soldier
fresh from state-side
in his first call to the front line
lay face-down beside him
with his blue eyes wide open
and with his last whistling breaths
blow bubbles and foam of snot and blood
through the ragged hole
that doesn’t belong where it is
or any where else
in the God damned world.
Tell me of the young mother
hot and sweaty in her thin pink night-gown
with her dirty blond hair
matted to the side of her face
in her tiny, dirty, two-room apartment
with no windows and no husband
walk across the smoky room
to the Goodwill crib in the corner
with the plastic fish mobile
and the dirty pink blanket
with the brown pony appliqué half torn off
and the silky trim all tattered and stained
reach in and lift the cold, stiff infant
and smile before she realizes what is wrong
Don’t spell Death abstract
paint it truthful and real.
Let me feel Death’s terror.
Let me feel Death’s sick repulsion
as the younger sister
stands and stares at the
smooth, heaving chest
of the past-out drunken brother
knowing in her mind that what she does
will not fade the memories
of his cold and calloused hands
on her young, smooth, hard-fleshed hips
with his Levi’s at his ankles
and her soft, pitiful moans
singing gentle harmony to
the sound of his belt buckle
tapping rhythm on the cold linoleum
while she feels with crystal clarity
the weight of the pistol
in her tiny, shaky hand
and steps back in surprise when the recoil
hurts her wrist and the roar of the muzzle
deafens her ears even more
than her own shrill scream.
Write of Death
Honest, hard and brutally true.
Write of Death
for the sake of the life it takes.
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"The death-knell of the republic had rung as soon as the active power became lodged in the hands of those who sought, not to do justice to all citizens, rich and poor alike, but to stand for one special class and for its interests as opposed to the interests of others. " - Theodore Roosevelt
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