Communion

When I contemplate the mask

In a thirst

I begin with three offerings:

Tortoise shell. Palm fronds.

A riff

Then a knowing, a raveling, a reading

Of the disembarkment, how my ancient ones elided Ogun

On bended knees, chose a sublime God

And lost one hundred fierce names for the earth, newly

Drunk

On lettered mysteries. They have passed the cup

To me, a branch of braided roots.

To burnish the tree’s sap to the tip of a thorn.

And pierce the veil of the world