Tuesday, December 25, 2012

No tienes verguenza / You have no shame


I should read the New Testament like a Bible or something,
but I won’t, I’m too busy judging the judges,
rolling cigars in Tampa listening to the news of electricity
in the enslaved air south of here,
if I were there I’d take out a few, ride a horse into them,
unarmed so the kids could have guns.

I see no reason to read up on injustice, poverty, and crimes
of the wealthy and their puppet tyrants.
They get things so no one can do anything for themselves.
But haven’t I written all this before?
I knew what I was talking about, closer to the action.
I’m still stuck in the Old, which has a lot of fine stories.

Most of all, I’m sitting in the dark listening to music
and when asked to stand I pull myself erect, dropping the cane
and jacket, unable to read the words
it’s too goddam dark, I’m too fucking old, Christmas’s here
and I’m somewhere else.
I should’ve gone where they were. I’d be totally here now.

They keep it dark to enhance the atmosphere of birth
in a manger for the children. They bring in Jersey calves
so it smells like what it is, the full measure of miracle
and what it’s like to be one when all around you
are the fucks who fuck you up and fuck your women too.
I tell you, there’s too much to say to find words for.

I had to say all this, it’s too exhausting to take it out
on myself, who needs to keep working until the day
or night arrives I no longer need to.
Then you’ll see me somewhere you don’t need one country,
which means nothing more than possession,
the bright lights on, legs like new, a voice like Pavorotti’s.

(25 December 2012)

copyright 2012 by Floyce Alexander




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