Armed with a book of poems I come to see the women with emptied eyes
rocking on warped porches in chairs their grandmothers used. Embroidery in lap,
they sew themselves to men with tongues caught on small town talk and silence, who
call each other by name, syllables spit out in passing like spare change
the clipped jingle of—hey Sugar Sue, Johnny-Ray.

Singing this language, my father carries the loose gravel of time
in deep pockets, shifts it from his right hip to his left, fingers it as he walks.
Easily as putting his knife to a bar of soap and whittling it down,
his presence shreds years of growing sure of what I know.
He tells me if my children are not white, they are not welcome here.