AFTER GARY BUTTE

“So crossing the river
and walking the path
we came at last to Kumasi.” – Kamau Brathwaite

Prologue:       The merchant

Did he arrive at sunset’s orange hour

or with the anonymous midday bustle

markets busy before Sabbath—

and evening or noon height, him

stranger with strange wares

looking for a berth

in the fabled city?

Who wants cantos from placards of bewildered widows?

Totems to soft bones of decimated embryos?

Androgynous puppets parading obscenely between certain jars?

—Any credit for dark sayings of Babylon, Bhutan or islands of the sea?

Fifth Avenue needs no merchandise of prophets—

with their Greek vases

their silicon tablets

their first editions

high-speed subways and twin towers—

won’t spare a dime for this Third-World primitive

his ark of Mesopotamian innocence

his naive style.

        ii. The new age

“ city of gold,
paved with silver,
ivory altars, tables of horn,” – Kamau Brathwaite

remembrances of ghosts:

masks of indifferent hostility

nightmares we had not imagined

shame applauded across networks

distractions at the frenetic tips of fingers—

                                            privacy, thought, prayer

                                                    ’itation, Jah—

                                                        banished.

        iii. A kiss

“It was the bolero, Ramona, the bolero

a kiss of jazz creole

lady with the Rita Dove lips

not forgetting, Maritza

Andean pan flutes breathing reggae

at El Solar casa cultural in Bucaramanga —

Celia Cruz, Lady Day, Sesenne Descartes

Makeba, Piaf, Edith Lefel

souls many, so many, Ramona

lovers scarved with rainbows

scattering galaxies out of sad earth

raising for us pardons, benedictions, homecomings.”

         v. Animal man to angel

“the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose” – Genesis 6:2

In the chronicles of giants

Fire loved a woman of earth

with peacocks at her feet

hibiscus through her locks

and deep dimples under her laughing—

when she betrayed him

(his fantasies bored her eventually)

for a one-boat fisherman and his spectacular nets

flung over green islands

and flying fish—

their son, confused between his elements

took to the airwaves

and broadcast himself Hurucan

furious against surf, hill

defiant lamp.