 | the builder & the grapevineby Ayodele Nzinga, MFA, PhD |
i send regards to the fig tree
i have been uprooted again
on a new porch sending prayers
by crows to oshun & shango
i whisper to the grape vine
promising it grapes
i am here
you will be cared for as long as
i have in this place
we don't know how long
that will be but tell the
bare apple tree
out back that i am here
you will be tended
ask the crows they know
tell them to ask the fig tree
it will tell you tales of
the builder set adrift roots
pulled up the road open gypsy
time again oya & the wind travel with
the child of the whirlwind with no resting place
fragmented buried in a million places
still three eyes wide freshly wounded
but not distracted
stone sharpens stone
the builder has been sharpened to
razor clean cut the meat off the bone
so clean it don't bleed sharp
barefoot on rocks wandering the sorrowland
coming to overstanding like a place on the shore
the grapevine knows i will listen
it is old it knows stories about the dirt
what is buried beneath it it knows
it has been waiting for someone to listen
i am a listener
here is closer to the water
i feel it
underwater ocean child growing
on the side of a stone hard to kill
like the grapevine & the apple tree
like the fig tree & lottie's bell tree the builder has
learned about being left behind
fending for self
how to build on shifting ground
to leave signs of passing
to pack the tent leave in the night
to preach on the shore in the morning
like sun rising
depend on my ascending
i send my regards to the fig tree & ask
that it tell stories of me
me of the everywhere like tales of
geronimo & sitting bull
leaning on diaspora nothing else can
hold the journey of blistered feet
sore souls the consuming hiraeth grown in rented rooms
landless dreams carried in dark bodies
like beating hearts
the builder has learned to practice flowing like
water planted in determination
rising like the sun disrupting the notion of
boundaries sacrosanct an institution without
borders bond by only natures law
a phenomenon intent upon thriving
the builder has planted
to be pulled like a weed
carried seeds planted again
harvesting the wind & planting
dreams of fire in it
the crows know
they carry the tale