Neanderthal Nostalgia

excerpts from June Jordan’s “Lyrical Campaigns”

photograph by A.B. Godfreed

What kind of person could kill
a Black child
and then kill another
Black child
and then
just to sit there/target
[a] man’s body at auction

This great American poet of democracy
a burning river
as cosmos
formerly citizens of some acceptable position
but
there was a child went forth everyday
one full Black lily
above the dirty
mopped-on antiseptic floors
and dreams of memories and
of the daring

This is a trip that strangers make
around the apple
flesh and fit
better slow down!

I didn’t know and nobody told me
and what could I do or say,
anyway?

People been having accidents
all over the globe
and you keep the pomegranate stacked
inside a wobbly
year old anatomy
horrible
inclination to kiss folk I…