Mama Iris
I have never been pretty
Something you would want
To look at for long
In market places, trading posts and bazaars
I have made old men cough, children squint
And their aunties made them wear
Their clothes inside out and backwards
After I touched their eggs and cork bottles
I got sick once and they called
For the blind healer
They will remember none of this
Only my harsh tongue
And how I wouldn’t love them
And think thoughts they think correct
They lower their voices
And give me drugs
Not close enough to opium
To make me forget
To extinguish me
I laugh for a long time
They come undone
As I drift off they are still
Trying to book passage
Into the bruised and cracked mind
They want to chart this
Become geologists of madness
I laugh the grapes from the vine
I laugh
And sound like cigarettes and whiskey
I am hoarse
I dream of horses
Riding fast
Fast, not looking behind me
I can see them with the eye
On the back of my head