Impossible to Map

i.
I gat a hang over
because of it,
I gatter hang over
the toilet bowl

and throw up my guts

ii.
how closely related
are the word
and the wood of the cross

the weight of the wood
and the weight of the word

the word made flesh
and the wood,
connected by nails

the weight of the word
hanging, weighing

upon nails, pulling
or trying to pull away

the word in pain

my pen in my hand
like the pins
like the pain
in the hands of the word

nothing more bitter
and nothing more sweet

iii.
little short girl in her uniform

skirt with its tight waist band
with its broad waist band

with powder about her neck
like a noose, like a moose

without entirely
undoing her loveliness

I am, nonetheless
drawn to her, attracted to her

to oddity

iv.
I write like needing to
leap onto the back
of a galloping horse

to escape
to get the hell out of town

v.
Sidney Poitier
is what we are capable of

Burt Williams
are who most of us are

why therefore
do we fail to blossom,
fail to flower

why does our hour
so often never come

before death knocks at our door

why must we go abroad
go elsewhere to flower
to tower

why are we
who remain at home
limited

like we are stunted,
dun-grow

when generally,
we are red wood trees

vi.
little Rolle girl
scrawny as could be
get on the bus in the morning
on East Street

it is her mother who stops it
who waits with her
who sticks a finger out
without smiling

makes sure she touches her child
in uniform, with her back pack
as they part

her child, off to school
she to return home

how different their days are
how divided until she,
on the bus, returns

breakfast before she left
she’d have dinner
when she returns

in her back pack with her books
there are biscuits
there’s an apple
there’s a tuna fish sandwich

vii.
how ragged my mind is
how rugged my life is

rugged road,
rugged cross

life to keep or to toss away

mind to seek
in lost and found
difficult to locate

I look for my mind
with this pen in my hand

with pen,
attempt to pin it to paper

viii.
how can I be well if she isn’t
if she is not

my baby ain’t well
and that ain’t good

is it something she’s abusing
or is someone abusing her

a prayer to pray
to make her better
if there is one

allow me words, oh, God
to say to thee
to pray to thee

to make her well
to relieve her
of whatever is amiss

restore her, I pray, please

too good to me
to see her suffer
to know she is in pain

to know there is dis-ease
or disease of whatever order
of whatever sort

sort her out
like the sort of things
needing organizing

and me, Lord
while you’re at it

lend a hand
lay your hand upon me

laying on of hands
all any of us need

Vanessa or that lame man
or me

ix.
pen in my hand always
instead of
a bottle of Guinness
or a bottle of beer

I, as inebriated as any
who keeps a half pint
or pint in the back pocket
of his pants

or quart bottles
in his cabinet at home

the opposite pole
of consumption,
says Marion Bethel,
is not starvation

instead of consumption
I am producing

drunk on ink
going out of my pen
into poems

as drunk as an alcoholic

x.
is Jazz just a lot of wind
just shooting the breeze

Mozart just a lot of notes

the rain so many more
so many fingers falling
here and there
on that and this

not even the rain,
says e.e. cummings
of his beloved,
has such small hands

rats, some birds
have such small feet

babies, until they’re able
to get to their feet,
across the earth, creep

is Jazz just a lot of wind,
just shooting the breeze

what though, what then
is the perfect metaphor
for poetry

this business I’m in
this business in me

xi.
flicker of familiarity,
of recognition

somehow, for some reason
eyes not allowed to meet

cat and mouse eyes
cat and mouse world

why must she
why does she
hide from me
in public/publically

all I long to do is greet her,
wave, say hello

not allowed to
she does not let me

just that I’d turn,
find her fleeing, as it were
averting her eyes
looking away

complicating
what could be simple
could be plain

what would be plain and simple
if only she’d permit
if only she’d let it be

I thought she was snubbing me
not that simple though
not that plain or mean

more generous
than I could ask for or imagine

what signs to read
what language to apprehend
to comprehend

woman flickering off and on
like insect in the wilds

wild flowers to fertilize
to flit in and out of
to alight upon

dance they do
impossible to map

this woman’s heart or thoughts
difficult to tap into

xii. Gerber

who makes baby food
made so much dough
makes pee bowls now
makes pee bowls too

to see this name
on this thing to piss in
on this thing I’ve flushed

shocking when I’m used to it
being attached
to a very different item

to bottles full of food
to feed babies from
with tiny spoons

xiii.
she wrote these
with her pale eyes

conceived these
with those pale blue eyes

what has seeing
to do with
the colors our pupils are

what has feeling to do
with skin color

or bruising
or not being bruised
abusing
or not being abused

she wrote these poems in Spanish
with those pale blue eyes

these poems
on these delicate pages

what an arrangement
these words, these poems
in Spanish
I’m unable yet to understand

as able to read these
as I’m able to read ants
in a pattern, crawling

where these words are going
or carrying me
I am not going,
I am uncertain

how these compound
the need to know Spanish
to understand it,

only way to be able
to read her blue eyes

to know what
these blue eyes are saying

coconut palm trees swaying
wings of gulls flapping

these birds climbing
how cold it is today


© Obediah Michael Smith, 2009
Written between 1:20 a.m. and
5:47 p.m., Thursday, March 5, 2009