March 19, 2010

Speaking in English

                                  I have these
voices in my blood that sang me sitting here
                                                            John Lent


You could walk along an avenue here
many places actually and there would appear
unmagically asphalt and road signs and
houses, large and small, and a store
and another (a pedestrian—“hello”) and
another (this one selling something you need
to go with the stuff the first one is selling)
and a restaurant and another,
a government office, a police station . . .
well, you get the picture

You could walk along an avenue here
unmagically and begin to peel away
its imposition, to trace the paths
of its assertion, to unearth (much like
an unearthed mass grave that had gone
unrecorded) the measures of violence
that made this avenue you walk

You could walk differently along this
incline of forgotten waterways
and smell the uprooted vegetation
notice a furtive movement here
a motion that is unmagically you.

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