The kitchen table was where my mother taught me about the world. No,it wasn’t, becausethere was no kitchen table.She always cooked outside, close to a wall, with firewood.Until one day the wind brought down the fence on her back.After the bricks came hard on her, she disappeared into the rubble. Her back held bruises.It was …
II Home is always calling. Singing with the mouth of all things I have taken for granted. What I want to erasefrom the past is pain. But how else will future learn the taste of joy? First, I tune my ears to the soundof water tumbling from a hillside, and the nimble bird, a hammerkop, …
I. 1966 In time I can move backward, just as I can move forward, and the past, ever-present, lingers on. The supposition is that I will continue to listen to the swishing songs of a field of sorghumand pretend they are prayers. But for a handful of people tucked away in the obscure fringes,the peasants, …