A new number for every time I don’t know what it means to be "black"
A new number for every time I could’ve been anything else

&nbsp;

###### 1.
###### Gelatin Silver.  (`i am)`

carving a swan’s contour out of silence
I jumped into the muted beak

and blur of William Klein
throat-locks unlock

and I sing
inside the softness

of chrysalis kingdoms

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

###### 73.
###### Tissue red.  (`i am)`

a type of depression that patience would kill for

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

###### 6.
###### Soft Velvet yellow. (`i am)`

where I sit by the rolled down window
of summer and watch pedestrian life

Spider by like streamers
twinkling in the handlebared air

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

###### 6 `1/2.`
###### Less Soft Velvet Yellow.  (`i am)`

when winter comes back, again
for her throne of shivers and pejorative shawls

distant warmth of August
like the reflection of a smile

from the other side of a murky cesura

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

###### 29.
###### Obvious Violet.   (`i am)`

poetry crumbs
for my tired peoples

who know the barnyard rink of a dark’s cold

who wear sung loops
above the hurtled-ash of their cheek bones

whose eyes— castled with sleep
are cornered with the adhesive muck of dream knots

whose fingers are the AM excavators
digging out sleep coal from eye-hole mines

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

###### 63.
###### Understated Pre-Brown.   (`i am)`

enflamed kiss of vellum hide
widened by skin blooms


I have pulled every last tooth and pin
every splinter of celebration lost

I wrap them all in fossil gauze
to prevent an unraveling of my names

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

###### 88.
###### Stable Green.   (`i am)`

the other day
a fluorescent string
of subway lights
swung across your eyes

leaving the impression
of machete stained glitter wounds

wash

crush pours and sliver mush
dripped into the way

I’ve learned to say
te quiero mi moreno

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&nbsp;

###### 11.
###### Time adjusted grey.   (`i am)`

the clipped and elderly cornrows
resting on the floor

of the black owned barber shop
grey crawls of woven secrets

former maps
knots of eye wince

and quilts of hand cups
reminding me there’s nothing rotten

for the soul hunters to haunt for

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&nbsp;

###### 221.
###### Itchy Beige.  (`i am)`

Where birds sing
debris songs

Into new nets

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

###### 13.
###### Clear.   (`i am)`

Who humble is
and wind

no complaints
despite having been

the janitor for all these years
cleaning up and rearranging

the mess of dusk
yes. in the same way

that evening sky has learned
to clean its mouth of old clouds

I too have learned to rinse
and spit

out the distractions from my days

&nbsp;

&nbsp;

###### 13, 13.
###### Clear, Clear.   (`i am)`

humble doubled
the way trouble grows

the color of oppression wrap
like the sprained Achilles of our culture

injured by the speed of all unnamable things
clear, clear is the color of real danger

the closeness of unwanted absence
hiding in the sun-sheath of day break

clear, clear is broken
and the way hatred goes

clear, clear is the open apology
to the bigot and blindfold

A new number for every time I don’t know what it means to be "black"

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