who refuse (click here for the entire video)

to wear shirts in public when one considers the beauty

of a black torso. If and when the dashiki is fashionable

again, I will sport it with the aplomb of a peacock plume.

For now, I have a row of coin-size buttons tattooed

down my chest so it looks like I mean business

even when I’m naked. I know that means a lot to you.

MODEL PRISON MODEL

Here in this small, expertly crafted model

You can see the layout of the prison I will erect:

The 17,000 six-by-eight cells, the wards

For dreamers reduced to beggars to my right,

The wards for strangers who might be or become

Enemies to my left. It has taken months

Of sweat and research to design and assemble

This miniature, but with your support

It should only take a year or so to build

To functioning size. Let me direct your attentions

To the barbed-wire fence which thickens

To a virtual cyclone of fangs above the prison.

With a good model to draw upon

I was able to create a terrific somberness

And then lie down and imagine the lives

Of the prisoners and officers inside.

I feel like this is a good time to tell you

My parents and first cousin have worked

Decades as prison guards. Nonetheless,

When I, a black male poet, was asked

To participate in the construction of this vision,

I was surprised. During the uninspired years

I smoked so much I would have set myself aflame

Had I not been weeping half the time.

I am told when my uncle was an inmate,

My father often found him cowering in his cell

Like a folded rag. You will note the imposing

Guard towers at each corner of the prison.

In the yard below I will loose vigilant dogs.

Whether you consider dogs symbols of security

Or symbols of danger depends upon whether

You’re inside or outside the fence.

In our current positions around the model

You and I represent the just, the offended

And vengeful, the grief-stricken and not-all-together

Innocent citizens. Take a moment to consider

The prayers and/or insults you might like

To shower upon the new inmates as they arrive.

Even a slur is a form of welcome.

I plan to have the vocalists among the prisoners

Sing for the old men who die there.

Perhaps their songs will soften the picketers.

The prison of the picketer, let me remark,

Is filled with empty riverbeds and the kind

Of desire that only gets tender in fire.

Last night as I finished fashioning hundreds

Of paper clips into the shiny bars between us,

I imagined myself seated before a parole board

Spilling indecipherable jive. Everybody is excited

By freedom. I was reminded of the theory

That says the body is a prison wherein the mind

Resides when I installed the small industrial locks

You see bolting the prison’s minuscule doorway.

In fact, if each of you can bend over now and try