Over the years there have been many versions of this poem, including on my CD “Libationsong” and in my book “Ideas of Improvisation”. But this is feeling like the final draft—
AN IDEA OF IMPROVISATION
WITH A MORNA AS STORM
I don’t know why, but nearly every night
sleep pulls me down deeper than the harbor
of Sao Vicente, to seek the fragrance
of a woman whose footprints keep falling
like txuba on the dry sand of my dreams.
Say her lips are bold as badiu di Santiago,
eyes green as the trees of Santo Antao,
hair black as the back beaches of Fogo.
Make her skin brown as the hills
of Sao Nicolau. Her smile white as Sal,
fingernails neat as the streets of Maio,
perhaps a pout round as Boavista.
Slant her legs slender as Santa Luzia,
feet almost tiny as Brava.
Who wouldn’t wish to sunbathe
on the divinity of such a beach,
while white-tipped waves lick their legs
with water warm as leite fresku,
palm trees dance in a breeze
or an airplane weaves a white thread
through the sky's blue silk?
Please let her Kriolu tongue
one day become
a sliver of kana
between my lips.
But the Atlantic hisses
like a Mae bedju
insisting these islands are only
ten pimples on a vast face.
My heart skips quick as a koladera,
why couldn’t these be
West Africa's fingertips
reaching for America,
reaching for me?
Tonight, the moon seems shiny
as the underside of a tuna,
an evil eye, it gazes down
tireless as any tide.
Seagulls now circle
like questions in my mind.
How far can anyone follow
the footprints of a beloved
through any dream’s shifting sand?
My pen seeks to plough
crooked lines across a barren page
or incline brown stanzas
into terraces up the hillside
of something silent as hope
until the bentu lestri appears to bend
the branches of all the trees
in the direction of one question—
will her quiet ears ever hear
these waves of blood
breaking across the rock
of my heart?