Old crimes like moss pend from poplar trees. The sullen earth is much too red for comfort. Sunrise seems to hesitate and in that second lose its incandescent aim, and dusk no more shadows than the noon. The past is brighter yet. Old hates and ante-bellum lace are rent but not discarded.
Today is yet to come in Arkansas.
It writhes in awful waves of brooding. My Fathers sit on benches their flesh counts every plank the slats leave dents of darkness deep in their withered flanks. There in those pleated faces I see the auction block the chains and slavery's coffles the whip and lash and stock. They used the finest cunning their naked wits and wiles the lowly Uncle Tomming and Aunt Jemimas' smiles. They've laughed to shield their crying then shuffled through their dreams and stepped 'n' fetched a country to write the blues with screams.