A spring afternoon, a lovely sky, bright sunshine.The long shadows of people strolling.
When I look up,
behind the cloud,
a sky of blue indigo.
Odds & ends, vendors, bikers-
the sun's warming even the druggies
on the Lenox Avenue sidewalk.
Past Harlem Hospital
smashed-up, battered and windowless buildings
all are washing themselves in a big puddle of sunlight.
And while the St. Francis churchbell
gongs 5 o'clock,
a young woman, mouth gaping,
crouches on the sidewalk;
she vomits blood, she vomits bile.
Then, without anyone noticing, spring drags itself off.
The layer of blue paint is peeling from the sky.
Harlem has tied its infected sores with a rag of sunlight
full of holes, filth and bloodstains.
Changes of season don't change anything.
While I'm looking up at the sun and the moon
side by side in the afternoon sky,
an ambulance is dumping a patient on the street.
Like a sick chicken
she's twitching and fluttering in the sun
(It'll take some time before she dies).
While I'm looking up at one, two, ten suns
reflected in the Harlem Hospital windows
my blinded eyes, my weakened senses
don't see don't hear don't feel
the people struggling in the steel dark prison
--- bellies empty, naked and under drubbing ---
for a piece of the star, a bit of justice.
Lonbway lonng, moun ap pwonmennen.
Lè w-leve je-w,
dèyè nwaj yo,
syèl la ble koulè digo.
Machann kenkay, motosiklis,
ata dwògadik ap chofe solèy
son totwa Lenox avni.
Pase lopital Harlem,
tout kay kraze, kalboso, san fenèt
ap fè twalèt nan yon gwo ma solèy.
E pandan klòch legliz sen Fransis
ap sonnen senkè,
la sou twotwa-a, yon fanm kwoupi.
Pa gran gòje, vàn bouch li louvri,
li vomi san, li vomi fyèl.
Epi san moun pa wè, prentan-an rale kò-l.
Kouch penti ble nan syèl la dekale.
Harlem te mare maleng li ak yon tòchon solèy
plen trou, plen kras, plen tach san.
Chanjman sezon pa chanje anyen.
Pandan m'ap gade solèy ak lalin
kòtakòt nan syèl midi,
anbilans jete yon malad son laplas.
Tankou poul ki gen lapipi,
li bat, li bat nan solèy la.
(Sa va pran-l yon ti tan anvan l'mouri.)
Pandan m'ap gade yon solèy, de solèy, dis solèy
nan syèl, nan vit lopital Harlem,
je avegle-m, sans afebli-m
pa wè, pa tande, pa santi
moun k'ap goumen nan fènwa prizon
vant vid, toutouni, anba kou
Pou yon ti moso zetwal, yon ti moso jistis.
An Anthology of
Haitian Creole Poetry
© 2001 Curbstone Press