Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.

I think a lot of y’all have just been watching Dr. King get beat
    up and, ah

                      vacillating opportunists straining for a note of
    militancy     and ah   

Hold your great buildings on my tiny wing      or     in my tiny  
    palm      same thing different sling

Evening coffee, and my mother salts
her evening broth—not equanimity,
but the nick of her wrist—

and my mother bakes bread,
and my mother hobbles knees locked,
and my mother carries the soft stones of her years.

Fists balled in my pocket,
riding the century’s drift,
I carry