poem
Volume 32, Number 1

They’ll Call the Cops on Your Fine, Black Ass

Baron Samedi, that trickster, he say:

At the beginning of the universe
Everyone got dressed in their best suits.

Hair on point, shoes on point.
Blau, blau, blau, check it out.

And everyone showed UP and showed out.
I know him over there, and her, too,

All these people I know, all of ’em,
But someone’s got to be the rip

In the crack of your pants,
Someone’s got to be the goop on the gown

That don’t come out, someone has to invent
The weave that gets snatched,

The fistfight between two neighbors,
Give a little reason for the lights to whirl,

Red and blue and sirens blaring,
Cruisers, like great cats

Stalking through the dark, headlights on
Full blast, creeping up carefully, a little afraid,

Because they know I’m out here, smoking a little reefer,
Swilling a little rye, ushering souls

Through the hole
I tore straight through the center

of the multiverse.


—Melanie Stormm