For Robert Hayden
Did your father come home after fighting
through the week at work? Did the sweat change
to salt in his ears? Was that bitter white
grain the only music he’d hear? Is this why
you were quiet when other poets sang
of the black man’s beauty? Is this why
you choked on the tonsil of Negro Duty?
Were there as many offices for pain
as love? Should a black man never be shy?
Was your father a mountain twenty
shovels couldn’t bury? Was he a train
leaving a lone column of smoke? Was he
a black magnolia singing at your feet?
Was he a blackjack smashed against your throat?
Copyright Credit: Terrance Hayes, "For Robert Hayden" from Hip Logic. Copyright © 2004 by Terrance Hayes. Reprinted by permission of Terrance Hayes.