Photo by Getty Images/rvimages.
a. picture of evil #2898
Mama Laura
hangs from the eave
of a bridge
dress like a nightgown
crook in her neck
feigning sleep
bare feet & fingers swollen
with death’s whiskey
this is the morning after
the mob stormed the jail
found her dark & vicious
like a coyote cornered on
a Guthrie-guilty road
this is the morning after
she was stretched &
slaughtered by the stampede
made haint
of truss & trestle
made wild in the wind
like a panther prowling
a Guthrie-guilty song
b. picture of evil #2897
bridge like an ark
lined with livewire bodies
ladies with wide hats
parasols & children
like shark teeth
the river’s brush
holds their dirty secrets
coiled words gliding
across troubled water
evil themes in the overgrowth
american justice
in its infancy
some dared say
there was a baby
left yonder by the riverside
the birds & bees
& butterflies
pickin out its eyes
c. picture of evil #2894
once
i accused a Boy of stealing
a line of pretty black horses
a line about a book
a book named for a lullaby
sung by a mammy
i accused him of a stealing a line about
a land of unimaginable iniquity
& so his Mother marched
to the Principal’s office
pulled my poems from her purse
held them twisted like innards
torn like petticoats
a bunch of river reeds in her hand
bruised with highlighter marks
those scarlet letters
raked between us
with the teeth of pony combs
she said i was a thief of allusions
the Principal called for a moment
of silence
then the Mother
wringing hands & poems
apologized:
“i’m just a bear for my son”
(i’m just a virgin mary for my son)
(i’m just a betsy ross for my son)
(i’m just a rosie the riveter for my son)
i had a little son then
a black-brown watermelon
seed of a boy
& in a moment of silence
i became even more grizzly
the Boy’s plagiarized words
became endangered bears
i had skinned
with my eyes
she said that shit to me:
i’m like a bear for my son
& i thought
sister, if you are the bear
i am a cunt like a bear-trap
the worst evil
you can imagine
that bear you thought you saw
that you didn’t see
the evil you see
that ruins me
yeah, she said that shit to me
& i went wild inside & it
has never stopped
the going wild
inside
d. picture of evil #2899
how you protect
a Boy from that bridge
how do i protect my Boy
from that bridge
when you are protecting
the bridge with your Boy
i’m going to braid & coat
his little tongue
with the iron edge of truth
the sweetgrass memory of the river
so he’ll know those tastes
above all others
you Pilgrim, you Cowboy, you Reader
there is nothing unimaginable about iniquity
this, our land, of iniquity
of tis of thee
on which we bear children
considered burdens
on which we farm barren wombs
of unbearable blackness
in these forests
full of men more terrible
than encroaching bears
looking right
into the camera
Excerpted with permission from Undocumented: Great Lakes Poets Laureate on Social Justice, edited by Ron Riekki and Andrea Scarpino, published by Michigan State University Press, 2019.