LIT

Artwork by Gunnar Wærness

32. (such a friend to everyone / march 23 2015)

the shadow of the homeland
is a sea that follows     us in our journey
it waits for us      beside the rivers
that resemble blue intestines     spilling out of the folds
of the map we stole

now i conjure from this tangle
of viscera and bowels
this carcass we once called the world     we chased it with swords
first in boats     then in books     and at last with this
one bare hand     that burns     here on your thigh goddess
which you now ignore as you answer saying     if you want to fuck
comrade     you have to stop calling me momma

these are not my words     that are crawling down the edge
of the map of the world     drawn with crushed cochineal
soot and blood     on vellum     here     where the seas have grown small
and the countries have disappeared     while the rivers have risen
and the coasts have swollen     like hearts and lungs and livers
all leading straight      to the campsite we came from
which we modestly called the center

but you understand the map we stole
is read best by those who made it
i held it upside down
and used the ocean as a lens
and saw other people out there conjuring
their own songs     their own books

the past is like the future out there
as water is like water     i used to think
that not everyone
can write their own histories
and i sang for the people     in campsmoke
and griddle grease     for food and shelter

but here they’ve gone and done it
written their own history
with blood and gunpowder
cock and pussy     here and now then
the people are a lion’s den     i sang

which other people enter     from which few return
and everyone we run across     becomes us     becomes us

what kind of fucking song is that     the people ask
i reply     it’s not a song     it’s a vision
and you’re not supposed     to sing along
you should just learn it by heart
and live accordingly

and they painted me with hot tar
and rolled me in feathers     you who are such
a friend with everyone
you can’t live with us     walt fucking whitman

so the story began
by counting all the others
who were chased from their fields

there were hardly seventy souls
on the heels of one they called the prophet
four lifetimes later     they were six hundred thousand

and the first to call themselves a people
a bowlshaped word that can be sailed like a boat
and shut like a casket

and opened like a book
to dwell there means to be
not only many
but exactly how many