Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

Since then-35 years ago

He had a new liver
He kept saying " 1986"
He got drunk once and arrested in Los Angeles

Now they make you wait in a different line
At customs if you have been arrested

I had forgotten
About that night
Had to laugh

Our son was getting married
And I was watching
Those eyes
I knew so well
That soul


It was good to see him
But it made me cry
The way he made me feel
Like I could
I missed the way he was with me
Back then
He told me
That my ideas about love were not real

He was right
Oh those three words were so hard to say
When you are young and full of energy
Curious about everything
A question mark in the bellybutton
Of a dream
Of babies and language
Foods from around the world
Nigeria
Italians
My love
Beaches of badagry
Issac- his three wives and 11 children
He would call the fish
With his fist in the ocean
Primo gave me his love
I just did not understand
What love was
To me
Romantic notions
Intense emotional chaos
Yes
I came from a long line of very thirsty people---

This is a complex or deep poem. That last stanza explodes with significance. I'm not going to say I understand or relate to everything but I get an impression of it.

First---Badagry is a coastal Nigerian town and was once a slave port.

I don't know who Isaac and Primo are but they appear to relatives (or symbolic relatives). Isaac may have been a man sold into captivity. In his original life he had 3 wives and 11 children as was the custom (I guess). Primo was someone in love with the speaker----we are getting in the Italian and Nigerian references.

You don't need the background information to appreciate lines like

He would call the fish
With his fist in the ocean

The words take their own meaning. I can see a couple of interpretations here. Interesting poetry.

The title is "1986". Is that the narrator's birth year? The year of a liver transplant? Possibly. 1986 is a year way beyond the slave trade. The narrator is an immigrant to the new world or the immediate ancestors are?

Anyway, look at this line of poetry

A question mark in the bellybutton
Of a dream


yeah----I like t.

Also, not poetry so much, but something I didn't know:

Now they make you wait in a different line
At customs if you have been arrested


The last line of the poem is a super ending.

I came from a long line of very thirsty people---


I don't have a denotational explanation for this poem but I think I have an intuitive understanding----and certainly some of those lines are excellent poetry.

Righteous !

Excellent

beautiful and raw jana.....the honesty carries the day...

-wow- the feedback here is really awesome- !
I have to say " thank you"!!!!()()()()()
Happy new year my family of poets!!

There was sound and song
A drum that stretched skin accross the heartbeats
And the woman asked if she could put the center
Of the star in her soul- ()and he welcomed the chance
To love

She spoke more than the languages of the heart
Her spirit allowed kindness
She was quiet
The new grandma listened

yeah, and that last line is very striking.

I have stood next to the leg chains once used to hold slaves hostages..
That town makes coffins now... how amazing you know of the place-
Primo is an Italian father of my sons-
-issac was from Ghana
There is more to this story
Thank you