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My cousin kept me and his little brother
saved me from our uncle’s
pit bull, then spent seven years
in prison for his set.
Every other word
he said was
blood.
Uncle Nuggie showed us
how to make a BB rattle
inside a squirrel.
Two small holes,
enter and exit.
All summer I wondered
what leaves the body?
From River Hymns (Copper Canyon Press, 2017) by Tyree Daye. Copyright © 2017 by Tyree Daye. Used with the permission of the author.
I would drop to my knees for the littlest things
mind filled with a light returning
from aluminum-foil crosses hanging on a porch
I was made to believe so hard
that I was going to die
My family said I wore bells on my ankles
I learned an ancient dance
My Grandmother’s body lives
under an ash tree
on an old church ground,
her spirit can be seen making
a maple tree’s shadow jealous.
The church’s bricks absorb
the choir’s songs, they flake Holy Ghost,
If Trouble Don’t Come Today.
I visit, fall on my knees,
ask her how she doing?
How long is her hair now?
Does she still like it braided
in front? Still like having
her scalp scratched?
What y’all doing
in heaven today?
She’d tell my mama
If the Neuse River was gin
we would’ve drunk to its bottom,
its two-million-year-old currents,
shad, sunfish, redhorse, yellow lance,
All the blood from the Tuscarora War.
We would have drunk it all,
aunts and uncles would have led us in Big Bill Broonzy’s
“When I Been Drinking,”
until everything inside us began to dance
and we all joined in,
silt around our ankles,
everyone kicking sand.