Horses Make a Landscape Look More Beautiful by Alice Walker Page A

beautiful
    The color black
    is not bad
    at all.
    There are black nights
    that rock
    us
    in dreams.
    Or, if you must,
    bleach only
    because it pleases you
    to be brown,
    to be able to see
    for as long
    as you can bear it
    the whole world’s
    lighter face
    reflected
    in your own.
    ****
    As for me,
    I have learned
    to worship
    the sun
    again.
    To affirm
    the adventures
    of hair.
    For we are all
    splendid
    descendants
    of Wilderness,
    Eden:
    needing only
    to see
    each other
    without
    commercials
    to believe.
    Copied skillfully
    as Adam.
    Original
    as Eve.

NO ONE CAN
WATCH THE
WASICHU
    No one can watch
    the Wasichu
    anymore
    He is always
    penetrating
    a people
    whose country
    is too small
    for him
    His bazooka
    always
    sticking up
    from some
    howling
    mother’s
    backyard.
    No one can watch
    the Wasichu
    anymore
    He is always
    squashing
    something
    Somebody’s guts
    trailing
    his shoe.
    No one can watch
    the Wasichu
    anymore
    He is scalping
    the earth
    till she runs
    into the ocean
    The dust of her
    flight
    searing
    our sight.
    No one can watch
    the Wasichu
    anymore
    Smirking
    into our bedrooms
    with his
    terrible
    Nightly News …
    No one can watch
    the Wasichu
    anymore.
    Regardless.
    He has filled
    our every face
    with his window.
    Our every window
    with
    his face.

THE THING ITSELF
    Now I am going
    to rape you,
    you joked;
    after a pleasure
    wrung
    from me.
    With playful roughness
    you dragged my body
    to meet yours;
    on your face
    the look of
    mock
    lust
    you think
    all real women
    like
    As all “real” women
    really
    like rape.
    Lying
    barely breathing
    beneath
    your heaving
    heaviness
    I fancied I saw
    my great-great-grandmother’s
    small hands
    encircle
    your pale neck.
    There was no
    pornography
    in her world
    from which to learn
    to relish the pain.
    (She was the thing
    itself.)
    Oh, you who seemed
    the best of them,
    my own sad
    Wasichu;
    in what gibberish
    was our freedom
    engraved on
    our chains.

TORTURE
    When they torture your mother
    plant a tree
    When they torture your father
    plant a tree
    When they torture your brother
    and your sister
    plant a tree
    When they assassinate
    your leaders
    and lovers
    plant a tree
    When they torture you
    too bad
    to talk
    plant a tree.
    When they begin to torture
    the trees
    and cut down the forest
    they have made
    start another.

WELL.
    Well.
    He was a poet
    a priest
    a revolutionary
    compañero
    and we were right
    to be seduced.
    He brought us greetings
    from his countrypeople
    and informed us
    with lifted
    fist
    that they would not
    be moved.
    All his poems
    were eloquent.
    I liked
    especially
    the one
    that said
    the revolution
    must
    liberate
    the cougars, the trees,
    and the lakes;
    when he read it
    everyone
    breathed
    relief;
    ecology
    lives
    of all places
    in Central
    America!
    we thought.
    And then he read
    a poem
    about Grenada
    and we
    smiled
    until he began
    to describe
    the women:
    Well. One woman
    when she smiled
    had shiny black
    lips
    which reminded him
    of black legs
    (vaselined, no doubt),
    her whole mouth
    to the poet
    revolutionary
    suddenly
    a leg
    (and one said
    What?)
    Another one,
    duly noted by
    the priest,
    apparently
    barely attentive
    at a political
    rally
    eating
    a mango
    Another wears
    a red dress,
    her breasts
    (no kidding!)
    like coconuts .…
    Well. Nobody ever said
    supporting other people’s revolutions
    wouldn’t make us
    ill:
    But what a pity
    that
    the poet
    the priest
    and the revolution
    never seem
    to arrive
    for the black woman,
    herself.
    Only for her black lips
    or her black leg
    does one or the other
    arrive;
    only for her
    devouring mouth
    always depicted
    in the act
    of eating
    something colorful
    only for her breasts
    like coconuts
    and her red dress.

SONG
    The world is full of colored
    people
    People of Color
    Tra-la-la
    The world is full of
    colored people
    Tra-la-la-la-la.
    They have black hair
    and black and brown
    eyes
    The world is full of
    colored people
    Tra-la-la.
    The world is full of colored
    people
    People of