WordUp - kalamu's words

POEM: HAVE YOU EVER BEEN A SAXOPHONE

Have You Ever Been A Saxophone

a breath blown

softly intoned through curved metal

tubing blew in dazzling duo with the germane glow of life

gleaming in the gloaming of a gardenia-honeyed evening

have you ever

been a song sung in lyrical falsetto

a melody of sensitivity and sincerity

ear caressing, confessing yes, yes love is a sweet wonder

have you ever

riden a funky rift with the amazing grace

of a soft shoe toe tapper patting out a discreet beat

as you lightly and politely step through the gentle rush

of the erotic movement of slow sucking the tender of ten tan toes

have you ever

nimbly negoitiated complex changes

with moves so smooth you make silk seem rough

as you unerringly address each emotional moment calling coitus

by its familiar names like saying heart be still, skin stop trembling

when i come to see you i'm running cause walking is much too slow

have you ever

been so cool in your ecstatic quiverings

that even your shouts come out as hoarse whisperings

and the grunt of your getting it on evidences itself as a one on

one directional moan, oh baby, come on if you coming, come on

have you ever

been a saxophone, a red saxophone gently blown tenderly as red tyler

resplendently fingering the keys of our feelings, his horn a house

of joy from which dew drops drip as he smiles, winks and slips unobtrusively back into

the mouth of god, the only womb

from which such a magnificent musician could possibly issue

alvin red tyler, a red saxophone

when i grow to full maturity, that's the sound i want to be!

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: WE ARE GUILTY OF FORGETTING WHO WE ARE

WE ARE GUILTY OF

FORGETTING WHO WE ARE

i am in a room

4 walls, ceiling, floor

2 windows, a door

outside the window is the world

no walls, sky, earth

death, birth, & the relative briefness of life

inside is the same as outside

only smaller, less complex

outside is the same as inside

only bigger, more choices & possibilities

there are only three questions to ask/to answer

1. who am i, 2. what is the world

& 3. how do i change, love or leave it

nothing else except

maybe

            god sitting somewhere

            marveling at our transformation, god

            mystified, unable to explain the logic

            of how we have become just like

            the pseudo-human creatures

            who enslaved our ancestors

            wow

            after all the centuries of racist bullshit,

            lynchings, chattel slavery & such that

            we black people have suffered

            who would have thought

            that violent savages

            & impotent religious fanatics

            is what we would be come

            wow

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: THIS POEM WOKE ME—4:50AM

poem woke me — 4:50am

what most healthily marks

our passage through this whirl

is never stone

neither forged metal

nor mute masonry

nothing that sits

nor stands

defiant of time

but rather a quick sensation

potent enough to shape

several generations, e.g.

--the breath

of a baby

well loved

whose own grandchildren also

experience the enabling splendidness

of human touch & caring

a spirit flash which

creates space within us

to pause

& be fed

by the gentle trickle

of ancient rain

every life needs

an inner security system

constantly on,

continuously blinking

sensitively set to alert us

to respond to beauty

regardless of the dawn's shape

or our circumstance thereunder

even if appreciating

means awakening

well before

we are finished

sleeping

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: AFT/ER

Aft/er

aft

er we've

(or should

i say

i'd)

made

love

i wanted to hold you, but you have bound up from our bed & are gone from my grasp well before i am sufficiently recomposed to open and clasp my arms, so i hold the thought of you

i have just shuddered, exploded myself, funneled liquid missled into your moistness, am still gasping, only partially aware, sight is fuzzy, my thoughts are louder than anything in the air, i'll be all right in a moment

i hear you running the shower in the hall bath, the morning water covering your nakedness where moments earlier i joyfully was

outside the open windows a crow caws in the near distance, two streets away a dog desultorily barks, the wind moves a few leaves

our floors are terrazzo in some rooms, light colored carpet in others, overhead fans, enough wall space to hang art and photographs, rooms full of comfortable places to read

music floats from the small system, most of the time you punch up billie holiday, etta james singing billie holiday, nina simone mournful as billie holiday, or grover washington interpreting pop tunes of his day like billie holiday did for hers, and those sounds wind softly through the house, gently seeking and unerringly finding the ear, the soul

every breath costs some amount of air, sometimes the breathing is painfully evident like the labor of inhaling while running three miles atop the levee five or six mornings out of the week, other times the dues is less obvious: like we can't enjoy our separate lives and simultaneously be together all the time, sometimes i like to read in the same room you are sitting in doing whatever you're doing, other times i'm far away, far, far, away

i could never have written a poem like this twenty years ago, not enough distance to look back and see that the horizon is not just an ever receding, unreachable horizontal line in front of me but also a lengthy, spherical curve that wraps behind, knotted by contraditions and smoothed by the resolution of holding what i can grasp and of letting go what i can't hold

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: FORCES OF NATURE: HOPE SONG

FORCES OF NATURE: HOPE SONG

/para Steph & Percival/

do not be bound by your mind

you are more than your thots

we don't just trod down time

mere materialist bricks of sod

we are immanent energy

both of & from the earth

our breath is wind

our flesh is soil

each smile an array

of sun warmth

each tear a droplet

of dew

but there is also another world

which animates us

delve into the forest

of your emotions

squat before the fire

of your imagination

sleep with the reality

of your dreams

our spirit surge is

stronger than computers

the dialectic

of human touch & feelings

an endless motor

self recycling

in the manner of oceans feeding

clouds & rain replenishing sea

while our being is as definite

as the texture of rocks

our mellifluous souls

are majestic

as the stoic millennium

of mountains

our essence is

two in one

both an awesome

aspect of nature

& a spiritual

projection

of life's

creative force

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: HAIKU #52

haiku #52

a woman's long legged

wetness wrapped round my waist--dreams

truth--i touch myself

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: HAIKU #16

haiku #16

having lived over

five thousand days together,

molting pains bone deep

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: HAIKU #117

haiku #117

fish out of water

art shot from the bow of gods

we rise above self

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: HAIKU #133

haiku #133

no heart can be whole

til it's been broke, mended &

then re-used again

—kalamu ya salaam

POEM: HAIKU #83

haiku #83

pierced by hurt honed sharp

as a stiletto you painted

yourself indigo

—kalamu ya salaam