March 30: "Requiem," Kwame Dawes, Sacrifice and Sadness

Requiem

by:  Kwame Dawes

I sing requiem
for the dead, caught in that
mercantilistic madness.

We have not built lasting
monuments of severe stone
facing the sea, the watery tomb,

so I call these songs
shrines of remembrance
where faithful descendants

may stand and watch the smoke
curl into the sky
in memory of those

devoured by the cold Atlantic.
In every blues I hear
riding the dank swamp

I see the bones
picked clean in the belly
of the implacable sea.

Do not tell me
it is not right to lament,
do not tell me it is tired.

If we don't, who will
recall in requiem
the scattering of my tribe?

In every reggae chant
stepping proud against Babylon
I hear a blue note

of lament, sweet requiem
for the countless dead,
skanking feet among shell,

coral, rainbow adze,
webbed feet, making as if
to lift, soar, fly into new days.

____________________

Saw and heard Kwame Dawes read at the university last night.  He was . . . How can I say this? . . . Ah-mazing.  I knew he would be.  He filled me with the urge to write, which, for me, is the litmus test of a really great poetry reading.  (Another great test--if the reading is so good that it makes me want to abandon pen and journal.)

It is Good Friday.  This afternoon, I heard the Gospel account of the trial and death of Christ.  As always, it moved me deeply.  Throws me into a deep funk until tomorrow night, when the candles are lit at the Easter Vigil Mass.

The poem for tonight is in honor of sacrifice and sadness.

Saint Marty is ready for a little more light, a little less fish.