I
- When my dreams showed signs
- of becoming
- politically correct
- no unruly images
- escaping beyond borders
- when walking in the street I found my
- themes cut out for me
- knew what I would not report
- for fear of enemies' usage
- then I began to wonder
II
- Everything we write
- will be used against us
- or against those we love.
- These are the terms,
- take them or leave them.
- Poetry never stood a chance
- of standing outside history.
- One line typed twenty years ago
- can be blazed on a wall in spraypaint
- to glorify art as detachment
- or torture of those we
- did not love but also
- did not want to kill.
- .
- We move but our words stand
- become responsible
- for more than we intended
- .
- and this is verbal privilege
- .
VII
- I am thinking this in a country
- where words are stolen out of mouths
- as bread is stolen out of mouths
- where poets don't go to jail
- for being poets, but for being
- dark-skinned, female, poor.
- I am writing this in a time
- when anything we write
- can be used against those we love
- where the context is never given
- though we try to explain, over and over
- For the sake of poetry at least
- I need to know these things
- .