Amiri Baraka

STUNNED TO BE IN UGLINESS SO DEEP

And breathing. Like a bird choked on air. And sun come in still. Stunned.
And be about you being. And as still not seein’
No way in from out. Or reverse, or worse. Stunned
From thinking all the every part of day and night, and still not never
Nobody say you right. Or wrong. No they do say that.

Stunned. And not young anymore. Maybe never, not really
That. Old enough to breathe in trap door logic. In amazement. And stirred around
By what you know you don’t and don’t. As if they cd spell the matter better
Or trail the dog who need killing faster. Ok.

They is everywhere you is not, except where you swear you is going.
And them that look at you say that don’t exist in the 1st second and 3rd places

I wanted to be myself but knowing something beside that. And found out
That everything was locked in time and space and that you could find out anything
If you had the time and space and method and direction. Imagine the lost
Imaginings

Where you were thinking about dumb shit and didn’t know it was that.

Here’s a game
If you aint in sane
Look at the missing part of your image in the mirror
Now say to everybody who need to see this
There aint nothing missing

—from Rattle #15, Summer 2001
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