You’re enough to sift into an oblong alabaster box.
Flesh and bone charred and ground into griege
gravel fallout from torched cobalt blue winding
sheet; sheer dust of light blue shirt; the fabric grit
of serge trousers and wool socks; blue and white
smoke ropes of striped school tie; big voicebox –
site of forensic eloquence – burned down to silence.
Your long limbs set straight by undertaker’s hands.
St George’s boy, you forward and face flame dragon.



For an Athlete

Slow jog toward the shade trees
of far pavilions; you run on vapors
from the roar of crowds when you scored
goals on soccer fields those game days.

On you move, past the stands where you
exhorted the crowd ‘get up stand up,
rally, rally round your own Black brothers’.
Mark the spot where they refused.

You wonder if this journey homeward
will take you through East Lansing.

For you always hoped to see her again,
she with skin the colour of sweet tea,
nursed on a sugar tit soaked in lightning
and moonshine, that gave her the habit.

Magnetic, she fixed her lips to your mouth,
then to your throat to drink of your youth.
Step in time past the bandstand where
a brass marching band on game days played

pump-it up songs. Recall an old rhumba joke:
Edmundo Rhumba and his Ross band.
Here come the Temptations to replace:
cornet kettledrum tuba and trombone.

For you David Ruffin appears to perform
that high/low tempting Temptations walk.
All play now on pause. Stadiums in the big ten
fall silent as you raise a clenched fist and exit.
13 April 2024