HOLDEN CAULFIED: SECRET IDENTITY, 1951

Nobody knew I was colored.  At Pencey Prep
I mean.  Nobody knew.  Seriously, my hair—
which my mother called muddy-blonde—
was almost straight.  It really was.
And when that hard curl started creeping
I’d cut it quick so there’d be no hint 
of the negro in me.

It wasn’t that I minded being half and half.
I didn’t. Not at all—I mean, colored people
make music a thousand times more danceable.
My pop, a corny white guy, is always trying
to play the blues.  Such a phony: bobbing
his head, praying over the keys like he’s
Pinetop Perkins or something, but

he’s such a racist.  He really is.  The reason 
he wouldn’t marry my mother, see
the reason was: he didn’t want to live
“in some colored neighborhood.” He wanted
“respectable society”.  Such an ass.
You can’t believe people sometimes.
You really can’t.  Even if you’re related,
they can be pretty damn disappointing.

And Pencey, of course, at Pencey
I kept pretty quiet. Of course, I woulda
got thrown out if anybody got wind of me
being half-Negro, but if you really looked—
at my lips, I mean, and my nose—
you could tell something was going on
with my heritage.

Once I brought up Billie Holiday and
Count Basie and this kid (I think it was
Ackley) said, “What’s with the jungle music—
Some nigger in your woodshed?”
I almost punched him in the mouth,
but I’m such a coward.  I just walked away
whistling “Strange Fruit” really loud.

My whole life was make-believe.
Goddam private schools.  I wanted to say
I am a Negro, you dumbass,
but I never did.  I swear my whole life
has been hide and seek.  Such a lie!
Passing. For white, I mean. Really
insane: the whole race thing.

Even going to church every Sunday:
all the “love thy neighbor” crap.
They’re all smiley-faced, hand-shakin’,
half-ass phonies. And me too—and
maybe the whole country. God bless
this, that, and the other. And look:
us colored folks get hell kicked out of us!
That’s why I’m an atheist. I really am.

So, I don’t have many friends—
except maybe my kid sister, Phoebe.
She kills me. She tells people
she’s colored all the time,
but nobody believes her. That’s the thing
about people. They never believe you.
They really don’t. And nobody thinks
about anything. Even if you ask’em
a pretty general question—like Why?
Why any of this? They won’t answer.
They won’t even try.

RUNAWAY BLUES VILLANELLE

Maybe we could all just fly away
Time will say nothing, but I told you so
Not sure what else time can really sa

Not sure I wanna write this anyway
Woke up feelin like   I jus don’ know
Maybe we could all just walk away

No use runnin hot and yellin all damn day
Mom told me No one monkey stops the show
Guess she didn’t know what else to say

Maybe I should put my mind on layaway
Can’t turn it off—can’t tell where it’ll go
Think I might just turn away

Summa y’all go to church and pray
I look at the sky—   I just don’ know
Maybe we should all just run away

Gotta try somethin, come what might may
When that goes wrong, they’ll shrug I told you so
Ain’t that some worthless shit to say

People worry ‘bout who’s straight, who’s gay:
The body’s the arrow, the heart’s the bow
Someday we’ll all just fly away

When I go, just let Omar Sosa play
Then rock’a my soul at a Funkadelic show

You give me half a chance, I’d get away
When you think about it, same thing time would say

ANYMORE

Days when daylight 
carries a touch 
of night: the trees
late green with summer
whisper autumn    
as though the coming 
season were already here

and I guess we have 
reached the age
where loss makes a way
into every conversation—
friends, teachers
dead and gone—as if
calling it out

as if naming death
and its daily thievery
might somehow
make it stay away.

I’m almost
a child again:
The boogeyman
only comes
when you turn out
the light

but even with my TV
burning all night
I don’t sleep 
so well anymore. 

It’s like being caught
with the wrong thing on
for winter and nothing
else to wear.  For a while
I believed it was
the right-wing sickness
that had infected
my country.
For a while

I thought it was
just me getting
older: my parents 
recently gone, taking
their kindness with them.

Now I understand
it’s been like this
all along: the snap and trill 
of someone talking,
the tap of their good shoes
on the stairs

then silence—
with those of us left
unable to close our eyes
trying to find the hours
in which they once 
had lived.

FISH JUMP BLUES VILLANELLE

Sometimes I wonder where swans go to die
Or what they do when the good weather’s gone
I guess they fly south, but I never see’em fly

I’m right by a lake watching three swanlings try
Almost summer and the sun’s goin strong
You ever wonder where swans go to die?

When big fish jump, are they chasin the sky—
Or just tired of swimming all day long?
They wanna fly south but don’t know how to fly

I go to the mirror, and there’s this old guy
Guess he’s sorta been there all along
You ever wonder where you’ll go to die?

Hard to admit you forgot how to cry
And on top’a that you been shelled like a prawn
You’d fly away but don’ know how to fly

Hard to ignore that big fear stoppin by
Just try to picture first light on a fawn
And don’t ever wonder where swans go to die

Wish I could run like the hummingbirds fly
Oz tol’ me I coulda been home all along
Might get there Monday if I get me a ride

I go to the store but don’t know what to buy
Why not give up and go sleep on the lawn?

Sometimes I wonder where swans go to die
Prolly go south, but they walk—they don’t fly.

TWIN

A few hours ago, a man 
some call mentally
challenged told me
about his pulled tooth. 

“Still hurts bad,” 
he said.  People walked by, 
their shadows cursive 
in the late sun.    

This man—white,
maybe forty—spoke
as though he knew me, 
knew I would know
a way to stop the pain.

I’d seen him around—
unsure in the crosswalk, 
sipping free cocoa 
at the coffee shop—
said hello a couple times. 

His eyes held that
first ache, that hope
we hold before time
hardens our faces   

and I understood
for a moment—my life 
and his: what it means

to suffer quietly on Earth, 
confused by the way
things are—having

no idea really, 
what to do    
or who to ask.

NO MATTER WHAT

they say,
the poem still believes it
can be loved, 
despite all its unkempt days,
the talking out of turn

and not going to church, despite
railing around wild-eyed
like a madman with news
of a Martian invasion. The poem insists

that its recalcitrance, its bad-girl
panache, its misgivings about
the “free market”
might be understood

as a kind of spiritual incandescence—
a sort of alarmist,
post-pubescent awakening—
that turns the world

into a bruised thumb
plugging a hole in the sky.
The poem is done with speed-dating,
nervous hugs, dancing at clubs
with its confident but mispronounced

sexual edge: it just wants
what it wants which is 
to be wanted

without the cautiously probing,
faux-casual conversations
about its accents: the affectionate

anxiety about its hair texture
and “cultural background”.

Uh-huh, yeah,  
the poem thinks, shyly
looking a little to the left—
but do you love me
for me?

THE NOISE

for Natalie

What is this word 
not spoken but spelled
by your hips?

A word my blood knows, Lady—
the day spins with it!

Seven letters written
in the soft shine on your lips.

Ahhh.

___________    

Shouldn’t the heart be allowed
a thousand loves, to hold at least

half of what it wants?  Or maybe
just a kiss and a hug. I’m trying

to keep my balance, trying not to
act up—stare salaciously, bark

like a squirrel, but look how long
death is—and how it lingers, how

in comparison, a life is an inch-worm
limping its inchy way up the most

unhelpful goddam tree!

___________   

Isn’t madness the most 
reasonable thing? These words 

in my head, this hive 
of stutters.  I’m on the fade

but keep coming back
to that good light, your

long legs, that slow walk—

I can’t believe
you’re moving at all.

Shhhh.
No use arguing!

___________   

Sometimes I think the noise
of what I feel should be enough

to make everybody less likely
to give up, less likely to let loneliness

have its way—so I shake my soul
like Crackerjacks, bang my head

like a kettle drum.  When the Spirit
doesn’t answer, isn’t this racket

exactly what it wants to say?  

___________  

Maybe life is just a few names
swung into motion.  

Someone calls out, “Tim, how are you?”
I turn around hoping

someone can tell me. What I understand
is so small, so quick: it disappears

like a hummingbird’s fart!
Even Rumi shrugs at what I mean.

Huuuu.

___________   

But sometimes my heart
knocks me over

like some brand new brazen beast—
so much hope, so many thirsty cups.

Lady, I want your thighs around me
like Daylight—like wild grass

wants all that green.  Look,
I’d like to, but I can’t 

shut up.  I keep getting older:
and this is no dream!