In their morning papers they honor articles
about our mango in backyard; not recipe,
articles ! subscribe ripe forcing so.
\ Over there after home invasion owners
consider buying gun. Be thankful yuh know
yuh Falls, at brim to screech Yes Lord | no seasons
to poface lift through, wind chillin’ so.
+
Our Minister, all chest ‘n’ wood, conducts affairs
off the bark of trees. ‘These extensions you run pipe
line^like from our home > late night dream
sweet vending, Who takes you?’ gap thighs chafe.
\ Bhacku new minivan need sobriety ‘n’ space
to overtake; implying? on the verge of dignity
best grass chip single file | hair brush^like ‘im
scrape pass? I told you.
+
Beard long ago Capt Bocass drop this bell shape
anchor . @ringtone Prize reward | bathers not bi^
coastal iron heat into muddah wavelike sheet.
\ Eye roll sighs heave crate^lives high +
dry @nation ports | Endrush? gully folk
know what stars ‘n’ blight them apple kingdom
sight. Hush, watch nuh.
– W.W.
YUH RAP SO (4.8)
But Freda Aborigina was also
Modern, not only by dint of books borrowed
From Judd but also as modern as Desire
Itself whose cutlass ignores every whisper
Of conscience + caution ghosting its vigour:
Just as Judd sensing of a silence-Power
– Vaster than the wisdom out of whose womb he
Had emerged + still kept emerging with speech –
Would soon drown under floods of nostalgic need
For city-wheels of loud Culture, so too would
Freda’s mind-fruits need to leap off their tribe-tree:
All intelligence, first + last, will obey
That perverse gene informing all of Nature
From cloud to seed: the buried seed splits, eager
To sprout + keeps shooting up + branching through
The gnarls of its demanding mind
(from “Raponani”, by Brian Chan, 2023)
FARJOURNEY CARIBBEAN 