(i)
Strangers found them belly-up. Their barbed mouths were
jaw-wide
as if they had tried to draw down great gulps of air.
Every man-Jack of them
was a Xerox copy of blood-red ventrals.
Before you go, she said, I will tell you all that I know.
Aside from the oil, the gold and the diamonds,
you will be like a man who suddenly sees through a gap
between doors:
the one
half open
the other
half shut
where the poor pound hoes into parched land, their one hope
to survive all this, to come through hunger and be thankful.
(ii)
It was
fast-fast
that I raced in my sleep
to the sound of the long-tom
the dollar and the rocker:
dredges whose nozzles, buried in deep,
flushed out jewels
from alluvial beds
to pay off debts
for barter.
Seeing the burst
escape from the dam,
I ran and I ran
to the river-run:
I watched the dross
choke the drains,
its pulse like blood
in the seams of veins
and my heart pounded
at the empty drums
alert with the fear
of poison.
