Word

The first draft of a poem Should be scribbled in a mind That knows its body ain't free All that truth should feel like gallstones Like a bag of rocks on fire in your belly And gotta come out Don't Then you die Don't Then the whole world ain't safe Ain't that a poet's job Sweep this world up Clean as it can get A poem should be ugly Should start off wrinkled, loud, innocent and bloody Should taste like Flint water Should be dense as Georgia dirt Opaque as L. A. sky A poem should leave traces All over your carpet All up on your couch All these babies dying Some killing they own selves Women missing everyday Police ain't never been no good Even a happy poem got pulp Even a love poem got seeds A poem should have lines carved out Should ask a question it can't answer It should solve an old problem Should dare you to dream a world Outside your little ole lives Should make you remember that hell is here Heaven too Heaven right here too A poem should tell you Ain't no life easy My grandmother, five times great Was a slave on this good land Probably picked cotton Probably forced to have some white man's child Maybe died tied to a tree Never knowing her own name A poem should take you back Make you wonder If your nightmare Ain't really a memory A poem should sit with you On the bus stop On a rainy night and wonder If Jesus see all this Should ask what's taking him so long Oh you ain't ready Ain't ready to wonder if God and the devil Had themselves one good old laugh I tell you A poem should offer you its hand to squeeze While you release boils and flesh and clots One story at a time