TRUTHING
(For Charlie R. Braxton after reading
“Kang Snake Blues: Paradise Lost”)
Anna Mae Vinocasa in a
Clarksdale crib, her pink face
Battered by the news, the
whites, and the blues,
Pink face battered by the hues
of thorny dues,
Blood-spat a heap of clues ‘bout
how it be the snakes,
The river and the snakes what
put the Delta in low cotton,
Poverty the Delta in the lowest
cotton of disbelief.
Let Anna Mae and her griefs not
be forgotten
As we sit at wakes and sorrow
song in space
Where Anna Mae Vinocasa ain’t
got no place.
Jerry W. Ward, Jr.
January 17, 2015
