A Poem for White Policemen (and White Poets)
And when you flick
with callused thumb the butt-end
of that particularly weighted
and golden bullet aimlessly
and when your lips at night
meet your wife’s mother’s
husband’s daughter’s stranger’s
lover’s perfectly fit perfection
and when to you the moon
sitting there just so just so
stunningly quiet knocks and knocks
all night long majestic
and when through walls and doors
your kid’s laughter
cuts so swimmingly into the morning’s
last dream motionless
and when in the rearview
you see yourself seeing
like such an Ahab at the helm
this American music of now
and when Chamillionaire
drops from the speakers
and you too for a second sing
as if you’re smilingly free
and when you kick in the ribs
of the boy who ran
because he knew you’d do so
before you did before you did it
and when you call dutifully
whomever in your family
listens intently to the space
between the other’s words
and when you can for a second
see what I mean when I
say things about being afraid
we’re so indifferently alike
and when that toothbrush
stuck in its lousy cup
looks to you like a flag atop
your tiny kingdom and mine
and when a toddler buckled in
against the back
of his stroller looking at you
with his whole body waves
and when you finally finish
the book your cousin bought
you last Christmas knowingly
close it knowing he was right
and when the dog circles
the couch before nuzzling up
pressing her snout into your knees
needing you so much
and when you’re doing your job
simple as that and I’m simple
as that doing mine and we meeting
move always along
and when your tribe and mine
can make the same jokes because
we don’t you know mean it really
we don’t do we no I know
and when it’s a point of pride
to stub until it’s dull the point
with which you pride yourself
on such sustenance being present
and when we can each of us eat
as much as we damn well please
while the bones of black and brown
bodies stiffen our silverware
and when we sing so sanctimoniously
about it all in the loud
blackface we both wiped off
before leaving the apartment
and when we think the pronouns
are always us always ours
always the you that you’re using
here as being the me I mean
what if you’ve known by heart
since you were twelve the lyrics
to LL Cool J’s I Need Love and admittedly
never in your life loved anyone black?
12/06/2014
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