We present this work in honor of the South African holiday, Human Rights Day.

 

You are too naked for touching.
If I stroke your brown skin
as you sleep you may break. I irritate
your long dreams. I depress your awakening. I am
no good for you in your alien habitation.

Waiting for you to wake I wait
for a return from a long voyage, not knowing
what scurvy violence you bring back
to embarrass my clean house. Wherever I sow
perfection it grows into weeds. O my beautiful

How time changes the clean seed, how the corruption
of absence on my body, my damp hands. Awake
I am in sleep also, treacherous and lonely.
I don’t know where to go, where to find rest.
Come back.