Welp! Here we go again.
AN IDEA OF IMPROVISATION
AS MUCH ADU ABOUT NOTHING
“Didn’t I tell you what I believe,
didn’t I say that . . .”
Sade
Ifemi, you sang low
“hang on to your love”
but, how many more
REM cycles
before your winged eyeliner
returns to leap
the ravine of No Return
and pop me open
as a sommelier would
a wine bottle?
How long before
the white crescents
of your nails wax again
across the black sky
of my back?
And who could foresee
the talisman
of your Pi tattoo?
Half icicle, half feather,
it feels like
only this morning
your fingers found
the curls at the base
of my neck.
Ifemi, what could be
the difference
between a wound
and what wound up
happening?
Oh, freckled cheeks of Jesus,
I don’t know
what might spell
or dispel
these butterflies netted
in your amber irises.
Even still,
does Cupid not kill
some with arrows
and others with traps?
Or has it not been claimed
—as a saxophone aims
to transcend sorrow—
that a fool for roses
will soon be a fool
for rain?
What drives us to seek
the heat of palms
lined with
symbols derived
from five types of feral,
yet cashmere as
anything the neck
of a guitar
might fret to borrow?
Tonight,
we won’t discuss
your wrist’s brassy passion
for adinkra charms
& police bracelets
or how your contralto
once crowned
my love as king.
Ifemi, perhaps
I’ve been reciting
the wrong lyrics
to the right songs
ever since your ponytail
swung from
a burst flame
of bud
to our last good buy.
Pray tell,
is it a rhyme
how nothing stops
me from being
spotted like a Luna moth
in the halo
of a porch light,
circling
what’s tucked under
the Welcome mat
of yet another
woman’s tongue?
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