The BlueIris Semi-Nightly Poem Thread, 8/17/07 Bonus

[BlueIris]

"Deathwatch"

Twitching in the cactus
hospital gown, a loon
on hairpin wings,
she tells me how
her episiotomy
is perfectly sewn
and doesn't hurt
while she sits in a pile
of blood
which once cleaned
the placenta
my third son should be in.
She tells me how early
he is, and how strong,
like his father,
and long, like a black-
stemmed Easter rose
in a white hand.

Just under five pounds
you lie there, a collapsed
balloon doll, burst in your
fifteenth hour, with the face
of your black father,
his fingers, his toes,
and eight voodoo
adrenalin holes in
your pinwheeled hair-lined
chest; you witness
your parents sign the autopsy
and disposal papers
shrunken to duplicate
in black ink
on white paper
like the country
you were born in,
unreal, asleep,
silent, almost alive.

—Michael S. Harper

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. My dear BlueIris...

This sure is grim...

And sad...

I mean, it's well written and all...

But omigod...sooooooo sad.

[BlueIris]

2. Yes, it IS sad, especially when read as a poem in which the death of a child

and the parents grief are metaphors for the collective broken spirit of African-Americans after the end of the Civil Rights movement (the poem was published in 1970).

[BlueIris]

3. Kick.

[BlueIris]

4. Kick.

[BlueIris]

5. Kick.

[BlueIris]

6. Kick.