talking ducks
a cat’s ass
no ability to ask                
                 where’s mama?

our white hands are white
our first faces are black:
the nursing maid
aunt jemima and
all those jeffersons
we see on tv.
our playground rants:
– great-great granddaddy
owned
your great-great granddaddy
– why do you get so mad
it’s only history   

senior trip’s
tennessee parthenon
wettest dream of wet dreams
the plantation nation
where we study
woodrow, midwife
at “the birth of a nation”
while the real wilson,
august, says: yeah,
faulkner and o’connor
write about your creeks
and hollers and licks
those tick-infested woods
where the rapes took place  

but black and white
seed is seed
and the mix is in the bag

is white poetry possible
after sally hemings, carrie butler,
and henrietta lacks?
we refuse to pay our dues
to the black man’s wages
refuse to show our rage.
our poetry…
there’s no juice in it
no liquor of life
sullen and sodden it slinks off
with talking ducks,
with a cat’s ass