Clara B. Jones


Poem In 7 Parts

 
        1.	Negress
 
Maybe it’s easy to name a post-structural racist.
Baraka mimed metaphors rather than bodies in copula,
and Foucault mimicked narratives of power
in salons where stick figures watched from chandeliers.
That’s what happens to marginal systems and rugged landscapes
where matter begins or ends with a poor prognosis
like Christmas lights beginning to flicker
or nylon stockings ripped by a cat’s claws.
Skin isn’t polychromatic just because we want our love to last,
but your lover reminded you what a negress is for,
and he said, Don’t take it so seriously. before telling me,
We can’t have a baby, though Elliot is a good name for a boy,
and I always wanted a daughter named Merida.
Prescribing psychoanalysis, Freud said women are no substitute for men
when trauma and sex converge,
and the Ego is eroded by inner voices— 
otherwise, I would stand in the way of your full potential,
and who would want that except someone in a colonized tribe?
 

        2.	Infant
 
My femur is shaped like a double-helix,
reminding me that I am related to gibbons
and that our family tree has more than two hundred branches—
not as many as that Inga you showed me growing near the foot of Arenal
like a brown flower in wet season invaded by toucans and termites,
a miniature community dominated by moist epiphytes,
matte green and camouflage yellow,
the color of my skin descending onto Juan Santamaria’s tarmac,
oily like my hair after days without soap,
bubbles rare as a crystal flute holding warm champagne,
celebrating the baby tapir foraging in our forest
whose canopy is shuddered by Guanacaste winds
as I shuddered—
startled by the Bothrops about to strike—
striking the infant for fear she would leave me
closer to Stonehenge than Talamanca or Bribri,
mothers carrying infants to the priest from Cartago—
carrying wafers and juice for blessings he once believed in
before his manhood spread throughout the mountains
echoing the names of children he would never know.
 
 
        3.	Chimeras
 
Chimeras doubling like twins in the midst of meiosis,
developing while negro women fought on the corner of Georgia Avenue
after their shared lover pranced around them unsteady on his feet,
neighing words like babies’ babblings boisterous as dawn robins
or trains emerging from tunnels hanging on rails routed to Brooklyn
where Prospect Park houses were renovated, subject to trash removal
like dust removed from crown mouldings in the great hall— 
Medieval relics mingling with German artifacts,
gold coins from Frankfurt
once traded by the Büddenbrooks for a twelve-year-old Kongo princess
trained for household duties
and for shopping in the marketplace
where fresh hams and black bread were bought for lunch.
Germany is the natal nation-state
where families have tilled the same plots for six-hundred years
though short-term memory decays after seven seconds,
and anyone in Brooklyn can drive to Jersey in an hour.
Spring arrived early so the house smelled of lilacs in late January—
the grape arbor fulgent with fruit tempting her to eat,
but she had walked two blocks to borrow a cup of sugar for peach jam,
ruing sunny days turning strawberries from white to red—
naked in the field, she lay on the warmest mound praying for snow.
 

        4.	Bell Curve
 
It was more than a trivial exercise to compose a one-word poem
existing as an exclamation—
asking to be recognized for what it was on its own terms,
ruing all the other words missing the final cut.
Oleander was discarded, and, hypothesis—
both more musical than theory—
the word now standing alone amid original morphemes
destined for elimination.
I have a theory that my appointment will be canceled
because my doctor doesn’t want to give me bad news—
knowing I prefer to choose the safest of all bad options.
Being bit by a Bothrops is no better or worse than being bit by a cobra,
but being bit by a coral snake is, par sure, worse than being bit by its mimic.
All knowledge is theoretical
though there is always a margin of error of greater or lesser magnitude
when the landscape is vast and multi-scalar, 
and dimensions map weakly on a flat plane made of ice—
not lava—
around Arenal’s rim banked by snow.
Everything depends on national priorities
and the digitization of codes reducing many to few.
 

        5.	Whales are disappearing from the Sea of Japan
 
Why did Peggy’s brother blow his head off after throwing a turkey across the room
since Thanksgiving is the hopeful holiday
before winter snows laminate the air,
and Santa Claus brings me Barbie Dolls dressed like reindeer?
My skin turned xanthous eating Charlotte Russe with buttered toast,
and cockatoos waited for cockcrow’s soft light frightening the children.
Madame Butterfly was so sad that I left my cat outside with lonely pets
before they were rescued by a bored Japanese fisherman
collecting stray animals that liked bluefin tuna soon to go extinct.
A factory in Aichi cans endangered fish—
selling boatloads to royalty eating it on soda crackers topped with curd
before PETA charged us with animal cruelty,
believing my short girlfriend who said,
She is an animal-lover who plans to live alone for the rest of her life.
I never give gifts on holidays, saving money for my yearly trip to Kanegawa
where monkeys romp on temples and harass tourists.
 

        6.	Wait here to be seated
 
When Jerry jumped off the cliff out West
a birdwatcher thought the speed was too slow to cause damage.
Every day I see a blue jay around six o’clock—
time for my run up Indian Point
where Jerry undressed for the last time, reducing friction—
before I went birdwatching
but only saw bats echolocating fireflies
toxic to neurotics and cellists.
My daughter asked me for the secret to success
so, I said Learn to suffer humiliation by exposing all your weaknesses
before showing anyone your strengths.
Yesterday, I came home to see
A blonde woman standing on my porch
calling for my partner,
holding a drawing of Imelda Marcos
which I saw clearly through my opera glasses.
Even though my door is unlocked,
I use my key to enter the house in case someone is watching
since every moment counts when you fear your own neighborhood.
 

        7.	Biosphere 2 was funded by oil money
 
I heard about Michelle.
Cradling a beet at the market, I thought of a chambered heart
no longer pumping life into a hand once floating across linen paper—
a scribe of noteworthy genius writing for everyone unable to endure
or who lingered too long.
I listened to the cries of cats roaming underground
where fish floated up from the Hudson
silent as clouds floating above the Throgs Neck Bridge
which she climbed looking down at foam waiting to catch her—
as love had not when he fled with no remorse—
every grown woman her own keeper.
She owned loneliness.
Each Saturday in March I sort produce for a Spring salad
of watercress and artichokes tossed with creminis and lemon oil—
clean as mist over flowing water
keeping moss green along the banks
where a child would search for shards of glass the color of eggplant.

Clara B. Jones is a Knowledge Worker practicing in Silver Spring, MD, USA.

An earlier version of "Poem in 7 Parts" appeared in the late Reuben Woolley's online zine I am not a silent poet

 
 

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