Golden Shovel #1: truth in G #: old-infirm-mary, and: Golden Shovel #2: John Edmonston(e), or "Darwin's negro bird-stuffer", and: Golden Shovel #3: Watch Face

Golden Shovel #1: truth in G #: old-infirm-mary

after Gwendolyn Brooks's

"Old Mary" & "truth"

Turning again this spade of gold,I rehearse scenes from an infirmary.

Charting horizons of mourning haze in myHead, fierce dread comes hammering to last,

Settling in a dear thick shelter of defense.How hard, heavily firm, I prayed for th-th-th-is—

To feel sweet, snug coolness, theWay I remember, always in the present

As memories are, loosed from tenseUnawareness, a door ajar, yet dark. It

Remains familiar, because littleHas changed by the lengthy hurts,

Sessions with shade shimmering in me.Flashes come one after other, shudder now,

As before, with a fear to weep, to flee, to, to,To sleep all through the night-years—and to know

all these years, my senses seizing as Irecollect—that hurt happens now. And it shall

Be through the propitious wake of the sun, notInto its blaze, that I pass, hearing: onward, go. . .

Golden Shovel #2: John Edmonston(e), or "Darwin's negro bird-stuffer"

after Sizzla Kalonji and Ahikar (700 B.C.)

"Oh my child! . . . and a sparrow in thy hand

is better than a thousand sparrows flying. . ."

From proverb 49, translated from Aramaic

We learn of Charles Darwin, don'tWe all? Whose theories take a biteOut of orthodox gospel of theDay. To him we give a handOf praise for recognizing thatProcess of selection that feedsDynamisms, naturally. But you Wonder, from where he is inspired, don'tYou? Examining mollusk, beak, and beeOn islands far from his own with a greedyEye to observe, collect, categorize, and aKnack for preserving those dead birdSpecimens packing his Beagle inVoyages keeping every handBusy. He dislikes medicine, which isWhy he spent hours at the museum worthMore than he could know then, moreThan we are taught now, more thanTaxidermy. Perhaps he learned—us twoMen setting together at work stuffing-inConversation—about life, joys, ills, mysteries: theStuff of slaves, scientists, of biology, and bush.

Golden Shovel #3: Watch Face

after Fred D'Aguiar's "Demerara Sugar"

What might it mean to be called SugarDumpling returning a shtups eye-pass to cutRight through a caller's very being by

Mere nod slight gesture of handSquint gaze back & forth swingingSwift across the chest as a cutlass

Does its work chopping with-Out regard to wood or flesh or halfSomething between this world or an-

Other bodies speaking by tooth & eyeWith lip to nose fastening mean mug keptUp in a permanent screw twisted on

Crumpled cheeks that just about anyOld worm pecking pidgin snakeCan induce to shrivel wrapping

Smooth folds of face in on itsOwn contours you just can't feel a wayAbout because men we're more than around

Pain but create it from lash word look caneWhen mothers collect spent remains from fields