Sex and Age

Sex with a white girl
(-after Hayes)

If you hide inside the broom closet,
You’d be able to walk tall again too:
The two week boot-camp with fatigue,

the drill sergeants rose tattoo. You
can be the only black boy along the
brick wall, outside, beyond the drill yard:

the cold open showers that fell short of
innocence, all our dicks were small, even
my own dark dagger was shallow,

the game of crash, the smell of blood in
barracks, between beds made neat every
morning, the trashcan alarm clocks.

How they would yell and bang, their spit
burned my irises that were forced to be
blue. The birds repeated the clap. Clap.

Clap. Boyish dreams subsided.
I was jerked back into the sick of all
The wrong reasons to be in love,

and she was the only one who understood,
the early teenage writings and angst, in the
blue and white composition book.

Genie, she would spend the spare afternoons
gently thumbing the pages, she kissed the
edges after each leaf, her powdery fingers

graced my neck, to my chest, to my waist,
stop…
what would your mother think? If you

made friend with a boy in shadow,
where the soft beats drew bodies so
close together that we would become one.

But we needed to be ready with all the
protections of Troy, it was decided that
tonight was to be our night to transcend,

while midnight watch was on leave,
the shadows moved quickly on the floor
to the door and we met with eyes. Briefly,

we must have gazed too long, and the
moment had passed and her moment was
preserved, I never had sex with a white girl.

-Chester Stoney

Outside Looking In

Lone Swordsman
Weary. Battle worn. Blood soaked.

He travels the path of solidarity,
With no friends. With no guide.
Under twin moons that gaze only upon him,
As he trudges in old wooden sandals,
The worn lumber splitting under toe,
With every step drawing him both near
And far from home.

He is Hái Xuán, the mysterious black child
Sun of the měi zhōu bào(panther), son of the gē(dove)

He pauses on his journey to write,
On stone, on bark, on river, on sky,
He takes the overtreaded mud and
Produces sculptures that last for a moment.

His hair does not part the wind, but
Coils cautiously around carefully woven
Bands of red and white braided, grown
Beyond the point of comfort, as cracks
Trace his face from eye to cheek, to
Chin and disappear.

(How many this has killed is not certain,
Does anyone count the meals of a lion,
Or for that matter is death really all that bad.)

He arrives at this plane of equlibrium
To find his face on others, on children
In cages with no locks, and he drops
To his knees, only to catch his breath,
Then he draws his sword.