Tyehimba Jess Poems

Let me tell you how
white hands kilned me
in the moonless middle
...

We three warriors
were called forth
to be, forever, enemies.
...

When I got old enough
I asked my mother,
to her surprise,
...

Our Box Henry hid away.
John Berryman's Ol' Henry sulked.
I see his point—he was trying to put one over.
...

when your man comes home from prison,
when he comes back like the wound
and you are the stitch,
...

Did a slave song at a master's bidding
mark Tom while asleep in Charity's womb?
The whole plantation would be called to sing
...

Hear how sky opens its maw to swallow
Earth? To claim each blade and being and rock
with its spit? Become your own full sky. Own
...

I had no idea Tom would make me rich.
Blind and crazed, like a blessed up idiot,
he'd sing bluebird songs in perfect pitch,
...

Who am I to deny this world? This gift
of music storming through me? It howls out
my fingers when I reach into God's mouth
...

the war speaks at night
with its lips of shredded children,
with its brow of plastique
...