(For Melani N. Douglas, Rachel Eliza Griffiths & Fred Joiner)
By Truth Thomas
At the American Poetry Museum
on Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue
Southeast, on a snow plow rumbling
night, art wanders in off the street
to hold its own hand, like a dazed
tornado survivor, and looks around
as if in search of missing kin who
never made it to the storm cellar.
Pictures and poets greet it at the door
that opens and closes like a heart valve
made of glass. Pictures and poets
invite it in to sit, as words catch fire
like logs to thaw the air. But there is
no politeness in the sitting of art—no
turning of its cell phone completely
off. Even as elegant F Stop hips
arrest, verses stalk with eye shadow,
leopard skinned stilettos climb up
stanza trees and pounce, art will not
be still. It will not “be good.” It will
interrupt you when you are speaking
and not say “excuse me.” It will duck
inside your door and eat up all your
cookies because it is hungry. It is
always hungry—especially here in
Anacostia’s abandoned mouth—in
Anacostia, where rats still bitch slap
gentrified poodles. Tell them Basquiat—
tell them Vincent’s ear, what fires can
be controlled, what blazes cannot.
Speak water in this crowd before
Adam’s apples on microphones take
their final swallows, and let them
know, “art is a siren without an off
switch.” Even in the company of its
twin, there is no sedative in family
ties. It seeks attention like every
ambulance passing, attempts to win
a shouting match in the mirror,
urinates a smiley face in snow just
outside of gallery shine, assaults our
noses like 20 skunks with stomach
trouble. All of this it does, because it
has to—because we force it to—
because here, astride our cushions of
refreshment, walls of polished frames,
short of its gang fight of police lights,
we might forget it’s still the living,
needful, thing.
_____________
Truth Thomas is a singer, songwriter, and poet, born in Knoxville, Tennessee, raised in Washington, DC. He is the author of three collections of poetry: Party of Black (Flipped Eye/Mouthmark Press, 2006), A Day of Presence (Flipped Eye Publishing, 2008), and Bottle of Life (Flipped Eye Publishing, 2010). His fourth book, Speak Water, is scheduled for publication in the fall of 2011. He serves on editorial boards of both the Tidal Basin Review, and the Little Patuxent Review. Some of his work has appeared in: The Progressive, Quiddity Literary Journal, and The 100 Best African American Poems (edited by Nikki Giovanni).
Posted by Mel.
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Friday, July 1st, 2011 7:55 am
Categories: Issue 5.1, Poetry
