For the Sky, in Which You Will One Day, Belong

Abstract

For the Sky, in Which You Will One Day, Belong Ronaldo V. Wilson (bio) You had it coming surely, Surely, Surely, You had it coming surely. —Gwendolyn Brooks, “Ballad of Pearl May Lee” In this poem, a body is “gotten tomorrow,” snatched, caught up—in these streets, a chimp, firing screams, ripping off a mouth. Where did you get caught, where you got caught? In the face, you thought you had it all. What will come is a door. Open up. In your palm, come eat at my table. What you see is how you burn. Sometimes you have to make up your own map. Sometimes the body has to be told, angle after angle, you are not wanted to recall that when they sit around the tables, your wings, they start to molt. You realize, those birds are dead in the nest. Those birds are dead in their fields. The dark in your corner is in your corner. Say, Convince, Cut. [End Page 244] Ronaldo V. Wilson Ronaldo Wilson is author of two volumes of poems, Narrative of the Life of the Brown Boy and the White Man, winner of the Cave Canem Poetry Prize, and Poems of the Black Object, winner of the Thom Gunn Award and the Asian American Literary Award in Poetry. Co-founder of the Black Took Collective, Wilson is also a visiting assistant professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Copyright © 2013 The Johns Hopkins University Press