I. An Invitation for the Fifth of June, 1967
You come back on your back
Barefoot skin roughened like burlap, glaring
Six days of war every year this same day,
Glaring. Skin, barefoot like burlap, roughened.
More have always died on my side of the line
but what does that matter to a narrative?
II. Sadaam
They were shouting
Muqtada Muqtada Muqtada
While he stood frozen perched
with us watching sectarian
mouths watering to the point of pain
The noose tickling his chin he contemplates
wobbling the legs of the stool he thinks
how might is the last thing one craves
in the moment before it breaks.
III. Osama
Shot.
Pakistan.
Washed in accordance with tradition.
A body raised tipped eased into the sea.
IV. Cairo
Loose of their chains, who should fear the unfettered?
V. Libya: Bani Walid
Say a student launches a rocket in the wrong direction
you cannot sit on the battlefield moping
brother, I need you to hold me
somewhere a {golden} fist might be being melted down
to make more of what is needed somewhere black men
are being gathered in the quiet aftermath of freedom
on the eve of democracy a dictator is shot in the street
this is on film for you to see the others go silently into dawn.
VI. Identity Card
All you can hope is that one day, they
will at least at last eat your words.
To sling rocks is tiresome
I want to start a fire.
VII. Mali
War on our borders death is thinning the edges
between bodies and states Some deaths go
unaccounted for to protect the project
to protect the project
to protect the project
I’ll take my imperialism brown
thank you
Sooner or later
Mother
we all must choose a side
I want your mouth open
Spill it
Whose child am I?