Fieldnotes

1

it helps to observe from a distance:
the field, for instance,

as a statement

the south has chosen to make,
the way whiteness too
is often rhetorical, as when an older student remarks

that in those beginning days
only he observed mlk's holiday

and why was it that he did
while his black friends, working, did not

2

in physics dark matter isn't "made"
of anything. it's a free citizen

that passes
unburdened through the field, through itself,

                         through you—

3

sometimes love is a black dot
in a field

sometimes, suddenly
it is not.

4

or how can black be

the absence
of all color? take this cruiser. see the light strike blue off the car like copper
                         through a fountain

5

there is a difference between what is fair and what is just,
for instance,

it is fair
that i try
to love your skin even when it is not touching my own

6

whiteness is an alibi, the way the officer was like a steam-
liner

          only I could see

7

inside where nothing shows I am of course not black
but that does not matter

to the field

8

some colors are indistinguishable
at night. put your hands behind your back

a different cop once asked me.
it was so sincere. he was so

polite

9

as a boy you learn to know the inside
without being required to feel it

as when, even now, I understand a bucket
          or a hood

10

he asks my girlfriend not if she is white
since even in this light

what we are is obvious

but instead the sheriff offers some western
philosophy: ma'am        he asks
are you here of your own free will

11

look at the word black
on the paper
& you will see a certain black,        a kind,

a certainty,

or if you see nothing at all that of course
is a kind of black too

12

whiteness can be anything, even
hyperbole. try this:

sit in a field. try reading

andrew jackson's quotes on liberty.
now force them away from him.
attribute them to the children of his slaves

13

by the road
my father showed me cotton
once

look at that
he said


- Keith S. Wilson (from The Blueshift Journal)

***