MORGAN PARKER
I Guess (or, Those Farms Are for White People)
It’s too late to live “on the farm,” fill me
with infants and butter and sometimes
remark w/ glass eyelids how
it reminds us of television
plantations and how that makes us want
and when I say too late I mean I am
so goddamn tired of wanting
because our bodies are so
black we are always missing
something I guess the money or the sound
sleep of new animals (no one
tells a new thing who they are and who
they have to keep being
they just feed them well and never
mention what it feels like to hold
a piece of your body and know
it is the reason for everything
why some window views aren’t yours
and some have the memory
of burnt rope and you do not belong
and it has been too late since this:
the first Atlantic baptism
you w/ your soft kitchen
and dark nipples drag your toes
in something you own finally
like finally a terror growls back) or
a quiet guiltless bed I guess
this floral pattern is not where we belong
I guess the radios stay on all night
and we are syrupy in our black I guess
this is a love poem
I guess there’s no difference
between a country and a man