Above and Below the Sea
The man in sandals wants all things the sea favors.
In a child’s flowered room a man watches him from a window.
A shark tooth gray and wet winces in his hand.
He grips it as if to squeeze the man at sea
into a blind spot, led like a child driven by a gang.
When the shark tooth shudders in the window man’s fist,
the man at sea chokes as if salt splits his throat into burnt air.
To the man in the window, all things the sea favors
are addictive, tasty — quench that feeling when the waves
will them to shore. The man at sea sinks
as if into the lines of the window man’s palm.
And the stained loss remains a plummet.
The window man hardens his hand
to make the shark tooth shrink,
stir the favoring of sweat in his fingerprints.
So he can see what he wants to do
and where he wants to go.
* * * * *
King of the World
for Muhammad Ali
Nappy hair tumbles to the floor.
Scissors in V-shapes, voices swell. My friend
stands in the barbershop to trim my
curls as I sit in the chair facing the mirror.
Hear the news about our king of the world.
Heartbeats stop. Someone says champ is gone.
Air raises the Bay Rum. Champ is gone
and hair piles against the shine off the floor.
June voices carry our king of the world.
His exit was a question of when to my friend.
The electric clipper buzzes in the mirror.
I miss brothers like Ali he says and parts my
hair into quadrants. A towel around my
shoulders, the clipper buzzes. Champ is gone
like a dream. I don’t look the same in the mirror.
Hair rolls down the barbershop cape to the floor.
In the aftershock of blow dryers and voices, my friend
says it’s after the end of the world.
On the razor, a butterfly, our king of the world,
lifts its wings. Uncertainty rises in my
mind, lifts its flashing bulletin to my friend,
how a body blow drops a man to his knees, gone.
He hangs on and brings up that the floor
needs cleaning and turns my face to the mirror.
I see a father and little boy in the mirror.
The boy runs in muddy shoes. His world
is the father who chases him across the floor
and apologizes for the mud. I swivel my
chair round to the boy while the champ is gone.
Watch him giggle mudpies at my friend.
In the street, fans chant Ali, Ali, as my friend
finishes trimming my hair in the mirror.
Sunlight clears the barbershop window. Gone
is the champ, our king of the world
into the great silence beyond my
bed-less blossoms of hair on the floor.
Champ is gone, our king of the world.
My friend inspects my haircut and, in the mirror,
my eye catches the smiling little boy on the floor.