I–Soul

She come with goatskin drum,

chattin liberty.

She come with skin-ya-alive rum

an fat, phat Liberty.

Array her in a skirt of peacock feathers–

or in Salome’ veils, or Lakme’ saris,

or Mardi Gras, carnival finery,

or showbiz razzmataz as amazing as Ras Tafari.

Like Josephine Baker in bebop cabarets,

like Maya Angelou in bongo-beat boites de nuit,

like sonorous smoke out of cigarette-clarinets,

she switches on stage to twitching flutes,

her hips shaking, her hips, shaking,

treating hard facts to a soft focus.

Song is trembling tassels of vowels

slipping like sugar through her throat.

Her crux is rife

with fire

near rain,

inner rain...

Blues note, "I mix up myrrh with my spice,

eat honeycomb with my baby,

gorge gorgeous him on shiraz.

I rise up–like a rose opens to rain–

to open unto my Belove’d,

spring molasses in my thighs,

oozin rainwater, yeah, rose liqueur.

I ain’t defiled to get filled

with grits, to undress my love a belly banquet

of apples, Calvados, and wine,

to anoint him with brandy and cinnamon,

apparel him in sandalwood and silk.

My garden fountains unto Love,

so lover murmurs, ‘Um, yessum, ah, mo,

please, ahem, yeah, like that, lovely,

okay, mmmmmmm:’ language

erectin monosyallabic monuments.

Jazz croon, "Ma brassy saint got bushy, tea-black hair,

an be a right-handsome crow-black, eh?

His lips be blueberries an his cheeks

be black an juicy like plush plums;

His all-weather smile promises vim and vigor,

the hard-belt of his male mouth;

his eyes be river eyes, preacher eyes;

his manhood be blood-sausage in tint and feel and fit;

his breast yield two sweet black currants;

his kingly legs be towers of iron

jetting down from a mahogany waist.

His kisses be tasty, sucklin tar,

his mouth wells with licorice an chocolate:

to love him is to weep."