like a walnut brain

SKIN-SWIRL

Wide lonesome chord of milk-train horn

across an Osage plain.

Lilac & star, American

crowd... shy bird calling the not-yet-born.

The microcosm of a Maximus

is like a walnut

brained by teeth.  That

worn brown face, in Omaha bus

lounge, spoke quietly.  “I am Dakota.

I’m a man.”  The poem

lifts a sign toward home,

that’s all.  The sum of Ariadne-

maze, malevolent eye of Minotaur

is in the skin-swirl

of your fingerprint.  Roll

back into the vault then, sailor –

shed each blow of monster violence

until you find the mild

eye of the typhoon-child –

immaculate origin of Providence.

I see her hero stepping through the gate

of stone, one hand held out

on a wave of love.  Light

scout, scouring the root of hate –

defanging that lamprey of predatory

malice, hostile cruelty –

injustice clamped on history.

With Coke & Blackstone whispers : Now be free.

6.28.16

India Point, Providence