Buying the Whore

You are the roast beef I have purchased
and I stuff you with my very own onion.

You are a boat I have rented by the hour
and I steer you with my rage until you run aground.

You are a glass that I have paid to shatter
and I swallow the pieces down with my spit.

You are the grate I warm my trembling hands on,
searing the flesh until it’s nice and juicy.

You stink like my Mama under your bra
and I vomit into your hand like a jackpot
its cold hard quarters.

--Anne Sexton--

The Negro Speaks of Rivers

I’ve known rivers:
I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow
of human blood in human veins.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.
I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.
I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.
I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went
down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn
all golden in the sunset.
I’ve known rivers:
Ancient, dusky rivers.
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

--Langston Hughes--

I Am.

I'm the enchanted forest without the magical tree. I'm the flying saucer in an alien land. The sanitary pad in a nun's lap. The rabid dog in the quarantined zone. The tattered rag on an urchin's face. The saliva stuck to the cheesecake. The childhood bicycle lying in the shed. The stringless guitar under the bed. The doodlings on the torn pages of the high school journal. The flat tyre on the beach trip. The jagged rock that makes you bleed. The crab bite that makes you cringe. The clear water than makes you see. Things you cannot be. I'm the anomaly in an alternate reality. Blessed with divine symmetry and anthropomorthic inanities. The empty bottle of champagne. The mute shouts of a dying soldier. The metallic hulk of a defunct submarine lying in a junkyard. The silhouetted vampire hunting criminals in the dark. The swiveling bottle of Cuty Sark. The detectable sperm in the dung pile. The doomed worker in a coal mine. As much barbiturate as amphetemine. I'm Vishnu and Shiva combined. The politicized ferociousness of a Moulvi gone asinine. The red cheek of a slapped school-child. The bleeding nose of the thrashed wife. The glow of a toddler's smile. Within me, Oedipus and Electra combined. The ceaseless maternal fretting that drives sons wild. Fatherly nonchalance that makes you deprived. The malicious pettiness of the political giants. All this and more. I am. I continue to be.

--Hussain Dada--