Poems

14 haiku

(for Emmett Louis Till)

1.

Your limbs buried

in northern muscle carry

their own heartbeat

2.

Mississippi…

alert with

conjugated pain

3.

young Chicago

stutterer whistling

more than flesh

4.

your pores

wild stars embracing

southern eyes

5.

foot prints blooming

in the night remember

your blood

6.

in this southern

classroom summer settles

into winter

7.

i hear your

pulse swallowing

neglected light

8.

your limbs

fly off the ground

little birds…

9.

we taste the

blood ritual of

southern hands

10.

blue midnite

breaths sailing on

smiling tongues

11.

say no words

time is collapsing

in the woods

12.

a mother’s eyes

remembering a cradle

pray out loud

13.

walking in Mississippi

i hold the stars

between my teeth

14.

your death

a blues, i could not

drink away.

Sanchez, Sonia, from her new book Morning Haiku. Boston: Beacon Press, 2010. Please do not distribute this work without permission. You may submit requests to reprint the work of Sonia Sanchez from titles published by Beacon Press through its website.


4 haiku

(for Nubia)

1.

Telephone wires sang

her voice over

soft sister laughter

2.

you held us

with summer stained

smiles of hope

3.

i hold your

breath today…you sail home

across the ocean

4.

i see you Nubia

walking your Mississippi walk

God in your hands.

Sanchez, Sonia, from her new book Morning Haiku. Boston: Beacon Press, 2010. Please do not distribute this work without permission. You may submit requests to reprint the work of Sonia Sanchez from titles published by Beacon Press through its website.


4 haiku

(for Eugene Redmond)

1.

Blue atom

poet transcribing

our flesh

2.

your quicksilver

words waterfalling in

sweet confession

3.

you have taken down

the morning turned it into

a roar of blackness

4.

your poems…

butterflies fluttering down

to earth.

Sanchez, Sonia, from her new book Morning Haiku. Boston: Beacon Press, 2010. Please do not distribute this work without permission. You may submit requests to reprint the work of Sonia Sanchez from titles published by Beacon Press through its website.