Sean Hill - Poems

Poems from Blood Ties & Brown Liquor

Silas Wright at Age Seven 1914

Silas Wright follows a fish’s wriggle
In the shallows between reeds. He scribes the
Line in his tablet—as much pride in that line
As a man in his son. He almost giggles—
Still he goes on. The next letters come easy.
With this he’ll have more than a mark to bind.
Rambling across the page again and again
In messy rows on it flows until he
Goes a little off the page’s edge. He smiles.
He’s surprised to hear when his mouth opens—
That’s mine.

First appeared in WarpLand: A Journal of Black Literature and Ideas.

Insurance Man 1946

Silas, you might not be here come April.
Ain’t none of us ever promised tomorrow.
If you died right sudden, you’d need a will.

That way you control who gets your nickel
when you gone. Get your ducks in a row,
Silas. You might not be here come April.

Yeah, your policy’s up-to-date and we’ll
pay, say, if you lose an arm at the elbow
at the mill, but if you die, you’ll need a will.

Double pay for accidental deaths? We still
have you down, your wife won’t need to borrow.
Silas, you might not be here come April.

Being alive is enough to get you killed.
Did you hear about them folks up in Monroe?
If they hang you from a tree, you’ll need a will.

Your folks won’t have to worry about a meal
with this insurance when that day of sorrow
comes. Silas, you might not be here come April.
If you died right sudden, you’d need a will.

First appeared in Painted Bride Quarterly.

Joe Chappel’s Foot Log Bottom Blues 1952

I left that bottle
at the Blue Moon.
Emptied the bottle
at the Blue Moon.
And I’m gon see
my woman soon.

She lives in a shack with
a chicken yard and coop.
Got to be quiet—don’t wake
them hens sleep in the coop.
To get in that shack gon have to
bow, scrape and stoop.
Oh, I say I’m gon have
to bow, scrape and stoop.

I need a taste more—gon stop
by Bobby’s for a sip.
Needed a taste more so
stopped by Bobby’s for a sip.
Now, Lord, it’s done come up
a cloud mighty quick.

Clouds done moved in quick
and filled up this room.
Clouds done come and covered up
the stars and moon;
I expect, it’s gon come down
a rain awful soon.

Got to cross Ten Yard Branch
to the other side.
Got to cross the branch
to the Choiceville side.
I just tripped over a root
and damn near died.

Here I am stumbling—
drunk off some liquor.
I say, I’m stumbling drunk
from stump liquor.
Going to see my woman—
Lord, all we do is bicker.

My troubles fill a pail faster
than this rain coming down.
Said, troubles overflow faster
than rain coming down.
Lord, lightning shined them raindrops
like gems in your crown.
Lord, she a good and beautiful woman
like a jewel in your crown.

These foot logs getting slapped
and kissed by the rising branch.
I said, foot logs kissed
and slapped by the rising branch.
Lord, hope I can get across
and she lift that latch.

First appeared in Blues Poems.

Milledgeville Haibun

Beat. Beat. Beats beat here. The sound of the train on the Georgia road, the measured claps of the wheels at the gaps of the joints of the rails is the beat of the hammer on iron and anvil at the smithy, Sol’s shop, shaping shoes for mules and horses; and the sizzle of red metal in water is the train’s whistle, and all echoes resound and effuse, and the last word returns like watermelons here with summer heat, beat with a hammer, beat when he, a boy, broke into the garden at the county jail at night when the beat men were asleep because theirs were the sweetest, so bust one open, the dull thud just before the crack, and eat the heart and move on to the next; and he moved on to women and settled eventually on one and finally busted her with finality, thud before crack, and he measured time raising the sweetest watermelons for a time and time served he returned, a man, and he lay on the tracks of the Georgia road cradled by the rails. Heart stopped.

Old railroad, abandoned—
between crossties trees grow,
a feral pig roots below branches.

First appeared in The Ringing Ear.

Other Poems from Blood Ties & Brown Liquor Online

The Morning with Many Tongues: text and video of me reading four poems from Blood Ties & Brown Liquor published on Southern Spaces:

Elegy for an Older Brother 1922

Uncle John

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Newer Poems Online

Three Poems in John Hoppenthaler's Poetry Congeries at Connotation Press: An Online Artifact.

Postcard to Anna

Poems read for KAXE's The Beat: Postcard to Nostalgia, Postcard to Anna, Postcard to Wrong Address, Postcard to Eduardo, and Postcard to My Third Crush Today

A Home: Liberia Poems and Daylight Breaks Again Suddenly Upon the Darkness: Revelations in the Library