- As a Boy at the Elder's Knee, I Come to Understand Hallelujah
When a boy's drowning, he tells me, son, it's best he doesn't frighten easily or
fight the hands tugging him deeper into the eddy. Let the limbs
go slack as the water embraces his body
as if he were at home in his mama's arms. He tells me, let the river make him
part of it … drowning is after all an existence. & therein lies
my confusion with what's glib & what's wise, sitting at the elder's knee after church scratching my head as if
shaking a fist at God. I want to ignore him when
he says, boy, whether during his lifeor after, the dead will be celebrated in the lives of others,
but as a child I don't want to believe in dying,but to expect failure
in-between the successes, & the further failuresto come— [End Page 94] catharsis that makes a boy precociousamongst his peers—
so I turn to walk away,& he grabs the crook of my elbow
as if to determine the size of the joint,as if to marvel
at the skin casing over my bones,though what he's imparting
is the reality of death, of dying, thatit's like fire, he says,
it doesn't burn what it consumes,it celebrates it.
And Hallelujah for that, his wife says,having arrived fanning herself, & each of us growing silent,
like the soft murmuring after the preacher's sermonwhen he says, Now let us all pray,
& we bow our heads, our eyes shut tight,not praying, but wandering the dark cave of our minds, determined to knowif everything we've ever been told is true. [End Page 95]
D. Antwan Stewart is a native of Knoxville, Tennessee, and attended the University of Tennessee. He graduated with an honors B.A. in English and later received fellowships from the Bucknell Seminar for Younger Poets and the Michener Center for Writers, where he earned the mfa in poetry. He is the author of two poetry chapbooks, The Terribly Beautiful, and Sotto Voce.