dad said wash your face     you have buttons
    stop bouncing around up there
  you’re obsessed with games
why you don’t study
     always finding a briquet
   in my brothers’ coat pockets

poches poches poches and poches
my langue
          bien pochée
                     you fumes hein

no
    this
more beacon than lighter

i      the city of d’accord
                         a flowing djellaba
            my uncle’s voiture
    from st louis to saly

               attention
   you eat too fast
  why you don’t relax   you eat
like cochon

      dad tried to give us
                 himself
   in english rek

    maam
  nangadeft me
      but i didn’t know
whether i was here
      or there

a whole langue
pressing down inchallah
on the black skull
    a little black france
    a little black portugal
phonetic hell
  washed up with speckled
fish carcass
     sandy crescent
   dusty fez
that flattening waalo

je te jure was a sound
   like a sneeze
or a cough
    before i found it
   slinking across the page

dad on the phone
  the whole house
ringing with waaw’s
   and nakawakërga’s
and we were always
  there
   there
    there and   too much jàmm

that jamaican asked if
  i was ready
fi ñaam
     some fulfulde
  must’ve kept that sacred word
      rammed under her tongue
     waiting till the cane was bien coupée
  the sun incapable
of beating

dad gave up
   on his sourates
alif alif alif
                     his mother made him
    a gris-gris for his final exams
  he said no we are tested
on the greeks

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