which evokes Frank O’Hara
& strange fruit poplar bound
Evokes my mother’s tale of lady day dying
during her rounds & a night
over the Ernakulam jetty
with the diesel jasmine smell of tropic hot
& the way one wore her hat at that ramshackle hotel
But what it evokes most is how I can listen to Billie now
& not break down as she sang my sorrows
deeper than I knew I felt
for that sadness and sorrow is not my day tomorrow
only something that once shaped me
& then fell away
