Words Can Open
for D.B.A.

i.
unable to find to say what is safe
unsafe to say what you must say
with panties off

dentures to extract not to cause harm
or alarm

this is a scene from what event
what scene before the one this still is from
and what came after

Roger Corman
and those films of Pam Grier
awesome women in prison
fighting with one another
with corrupt prison guards

in mud, wrestling
in “The Arena” you get to see
Pam Grier's bushy pussy hairs

made bare
with other women prisoners
to be washed
with water from a bucket
splashed on them

it is back in Rome
we are back in Rome
they are back in Rome

when gladiators roamed
and in the coliseum
contested to the death
while an audience watched
and cheered

back to baby doll, in baby doll skirt
made exclusively of ruffles

her black skirt and her white top
fitted to her, fitting her, outfitting her

these against the warm as cake
just out of the baker brownness
of her skin

I'd be a guard gladly
in a correctional institution
with her inside, locked away
for no crime she committed

I'd set her free
every chance I got
I'd be her prisoner gladly

in this photo of her
I'd be the board behind the bars
just to be near her

ii.
it is language to which
you have access
it is this that is the privilege

school rooms, class rooms
these to enter
one sort of thing

where it's at
within the doors
that words can open
that words can close

hard to open and heavy
for who's unlucky
or are not able to find keys
or do not know the combinations
or are unable to learn them

it is within the language
where the privileged go
or come and go

stay or leave
as freely as they wish to
or not to

it is not the school, the walls
it never was

whatever the address
or the summit upon which
it rests

it is the language access
ability to, with words, make world

and to make new worlds
use words to break apart
to rend asunder

what excludes us
if we/when we want to enter
if our rightful place is inside

words and pens
to depend upon
instead of bullets rifles
bombs

iii.
much about her
I find disconcerting

much about her
I am unable to relate to

how strong she is able
to come on

instead of flattered
appreciative, I turn off
step back, withdraw

cappuccino cup, of paper made
to put a poem on in pink

marker all I have to express
these thoughts, feelings
misgivings

iv.
love the sounds the seagulls make
their squawking
sea gulls talking

v.
how Portia faces life without me
I wish I knew

how I've faced life without her
equally a mystery

I've had poetry, written of her
of times in love
of intimate times

no more than a customer
and a waitress
in a restaurant

but what times they were
connected
like something to something

the way a hose
connects to a faucet
to be turned on


© Obediah Michael Smith, 2010
Written on Friday, March 26, 2010
between 2:10 p.m. and 9 p.m.