Chasing Utopia

by Nikki Giovanni

  Good again

  It’s put a stamp

  On that note . . . not letter . . . and mail it

  To a lonesome heart

  Don Pullen sought community

  Music

  He wanted to play his tune

  Out of tune sometimes

  With friends who had another tune

  To play

  And if all tunes played

  Their own tunes

  Then wouldn’t that tune be in harmony . . . wouldn’t it?

  He lived across the street

  On 84th Street

  From my first New York apartment

  I don’t play music I listen

  Milford Graves, Cornell Dupree lived on that street

  Eugene McDaniels down the street

  Gregory Hines around the corner and a host of painters and writers

  Did I mention George Faison and Morgan Freeman

  And Clifton Davis came calling sometimes

  What a pleasure to be

  Young

  And creative

  And so sure of the future

  We added to that conversation

  And Don Pullen added to that song

  MAKING A PERFECT MAN

  (for Walter Leonard)

  Good Morning, Ladies and Gentlemen. This morning we are going to make the perfect man.

  Though you come to this enterprise with clean hands, please remember you cannot wash your hands of it. It is wise, however, to push back the wars and disease. We must understand that they are there but we will try not to wallow in them nor will we encourage any playing with them. You all remember what happened the last time we were working on men and all those hate viruses were set free. It practically took a world war to clean it up, then that Bush boy comes along shaking that blanket again.

  Yes, well, the first thing to remember, Class, is that mistakes do happen. It is normal and to be expected. I always remind my students, though, to be sure to start with the best, freshest materials. I recommend the soil be flown in from Africa. There are some problems, true, but, mostly because Africa could not afford fertilizers, the soil is uncontaminated. Yes, yes, I know that sometimes the soil is sandy or weedy and a lot of times suppliers will cheat but that’s why it’s so important to go to reliable dealers. You pay a bit more in time and money but look at the quality.

  Our task today is not the Perfect Man but The Man Perfectly suited for us.

  Now, I always tell everyone, intelligence. I would put that in first. I know there is a school of thought that says “Intelligence can come last” or in the middle or at any time but I’m old-fashioned. If you want it, put it first. Let those other things adjust to it! I like kindly looks. I’ve seen enough of those pretty boys who are cruel and dumb. It may be that cruelty leads to dumbness or maybe dumbness to cruelty but either way I like a good clean sparkle in the eye.

  Hold your question for a minute. I think knowing the Creator’s preference helps you to know what you are expected to make. I once made seven six-foot-nine guys for the Los Angeles basketball team and I can’t begin to tell you what a mistake it was. I could never smooth the arrogance out and Boy! Wow! Did we all pay for it. So I urge you on your first times to go a bit shorter. And that is also easier on Elegance. I can’t begin to tell you how many times I’ve turned down commissions from people seeking Defensive Linesmen. There is no way to make them Elegant and I just won’t be part of that. Your Quarterback, Wide Receivers . . . Yes. But the Linesmen, Offensive and Defensive . . . no way. I think football needs to go smaller anyway so that there are fewer injuries but that is not our subject this morning.

  Lay out all your ingredients: good black soil, intelligence, elegance, a twinkle in each eye, and now we are getting there. Gently mix them. A lot of you young creators think you need to knock your man around but “No.” Gently mix, prod, and knead. Don’t forget to add ambition and once you have a good mix a pinch of ambition is the perfect elixir. Now, I prefer patience after you have let it sit and mingle with itself. Yes, yes, I know getting patience in with just the right touch can sometimes mean loneliness but that’s why intelligence is so important. Remember what happened to Michael Jackson with all that talent but no balance for the loneliness which led to an overruling of intelligence and all that ugliness that followed. I think a little loneliness is not all that bad.

  Some of your older creators will recommend at this point firing him up but, as I say, I’m old-fashioned. Send him off to college, grad school, ultimately let him spend some time in a northern clime with a good harbor and excellent beans. Beans are so essential to growth, both physical and emotional. What you want to do is also remember to reward him as he does the right things. I would suggest a Betty if things are going as we think. A Betty is so easy to make. A good strong piece of chocolate. I prefer chocolate for my Bettys because it’s already sweet and warm. You don’t have to do a lot to give it a good shape and that place in her heart can so easily be filled with both intelligence and love. In all my centuries of creating I have never had a chocolate Betty be anything less than fabulous.

  It’s understood that some rain will fall so send him to a small colored college in the South to help save it. Then make sure they are ungrateful. Excuse me for giggling, Class, but I just love ingratitude. In the beginning I fought so hard against ingratitude with You-Know-Who but He wouldn’t listen. To shut me up He said: “Well, how can we compromise on this?” I said: “A Daughter. The only antidote to ingratitude is a daughter.” I’m glad to say I was proven right on that one.

  Oh, we know we’ve had our Adams and Georges and stuff. If this one comes out the way I think, I am planning to call him Walter: A good, strong name for a kind, elegant, intelligent, patient man. You can, at your option, add a sense of humor.

  And if for some reason he’s not perfect he’s so close that only the perfect ones will know he’s just a man. That’s it for our lesson this morning.

  WHEN MY PHONE TREMBLES

  (for D’Angelo)

  When my phone

  Trembles

  After midnight

  I never think

  of good news:

  Someone’s birthday

  An overseas friend

  Forgetting

  The time difference

  I never smell

  Apples baking

  Or nutmeg dancing

  On sweet potatoes

  Yeast rolls rising

  Fish frying

  I always look

  For a way to hold

  Myself

  Together

  Being a ’60s person

  I know

  You have to be

  Strong

  When my phone trembles

  After midnight

  I take

  A deep breath

  Reach for my glasses

  Think of my son

  And I Pray

  STILL LIFE WITH CRYING GIRL

  Please don’t answer before midnight

  I had a dream

  Last night

  I sleep with earphones to drown out fears

  Jazz mostly

  Piano jazz

  With a little Milt Jackson on the side

  Saying it saying it saying it clear

  “Save Your Love for Me”

  But I was living in a wooded area

  Very nice homes

  Strange neighbors with kids and dogs and stuff

  And I was in the kitchen by my mother

  My father was breaking up the table

  Throwing things around knocking chairs over

  He didn’t seem dangerous

  Just mean

  I picked my mother up from behind

  Sort of like a heavy sack of flour

  Or birdseed or even gravel for the pond

  And carried her out

  Then when I sat her down we were back in the kitchen again

  I took her to a vehicle

  I want to say a “car” but it wasn
’t a car

  No no don’t answer until midnight I won’t be ready until then

  And I drove away

  It was as curvy as all get-out—a dirt road that was

  Actually a lovely brown

  But when we stopped we were back

  In the kitchen

  My sister was looking

  And I was trying to say something

  Which came out all crazy

  So this 2 is not a poem

  Because if it were a poem

  I would put my head in your lap

  And cry and cry

  But since it is not a poem it must be

  A painting Still Life with Crying Girl

  And what we would see is a bowl of half-eaten raspberries

  Mint leaves drenched in the sugary liquid

  And a little fly

  Poised in the corner

  At midnight attracted by the fly

  The common vampire bat

  On the light of a moonbeam

  Will come to hold my head

  ROBERT CHAMPION

  (Who Died at the Hands of His Bandmates)

  The ever restless ocean

  Beating against sea

  And sky

  Grinds, no gently rubs,

  The bones of Robert Champion

  Into the salt

  Of his ancestors

  Driven into the blue

  Through Middle Passage

  We know the torture

  Of slavery

  And apartheid

  We know the terror

  Of Jim Crow

  Who would imagine The Band

  Would kill

  Are we having too many

  Black men trying to sing

  A praise song

  Too many Black men trying

  To show a better self

  So many Black men

  That we can spare them

  I don’t think so

  There can be no excuse

  For this murder

  There can be no I didn’t

  Realize he was dying

  How could you not know

  When you act like nazis

  Jesus is crucified

  How could you not understand

  This child should have lived

  How could Black men do this

  to each other?

  ALLOWABLES

  I killed a spider

  Not a murderous brown recluse

  Nor even a black widow

  And if the truth were told this

  Was only a small

  Sort of papery spider

  Who should have run

  When I picked up the book

  But she didn’t

  And she scared me

  And I smashed her

  I don’t think

  I’m allowed

  To kill something

  Because I am

  Frightened

  FLYING IN KIGALI

  Or

  War Is Never Right

  For some reason

  Or perhaps

  None

  The dew was just lifting

  Which is not unreasonable

  But something for no reason

  Made me walk

  In my house slippers

  To the little dogwood tree

  Recently planted

  By the shed

  As I watered the tree

  And, frankly, took joy

  In the grass coming up

  Where I had tried

  For several years to no avail

  To grow this little spot of green

  I spotted a furry thing

  Without thinking

  I turned the hose on it

  Assuming it was a mushroom

  Or some of the mold

  That occasionally forms

  On top of the mulch

  I know there could not

  Have been a scream because

  Screams aren’t possible

  For little birds

  But there was a protest

  My heart broke

  This little robin was out of the nest

  Before she could fly

  And I live with a Yorkie

  Who was sniffing the yard

  I grabbed the dog

  Taking her back inside

  And returned

  To understand

  This little bird would die

  The mother was overhead now

  And I put the bird in a basket

  To take her beyond the reach

  Of Alex though surely

  Into the paw

  Of one of the cats that roam

  Some will say: It’s Mother Nature’s

  way Some will say: It’s Natural

  Some will say: It is out of your hands

  There is Nothing you can do about it

  But it still breaks my heart

  To know that little robin

  Cannot be saved

  TEREZIN: WHERE THIRTY-FIVE THOUSAND DIED BUT IT WAS NOT A DEATH CAMP

  I don’t want you

  To watch me sleeping I don’t want you

  To look worriedly

  Over me

  In some hospital bed

  Tied up with tubes

  Laboring over my breath

  Until I take that last one

  And release my energy

  There was a deer

  In the middle of Highway 81

  She had been hit

  And could not run

  While waiting for some uninterested trucker

  She held up her head

  And I

  In cowardly concern

  Turned away

  There was

  On a cold snowy night

  Coming across the West Virginia Turnpike

  A rabbit which tried to cross

  Four lanes of traffic

  The head was hit

  But hadn’t yet told the legs

  So they kept running

  And I from fatigue

  And helplessness drove

  On

  Slavery was not fun

  The holocaust happened

  People are not good

  And yet we go on

  Until we stop

  And I think

  The only bravery available

  To us

  Is to Remember

  Smell—

  As we all know—

  Is half the taste

  TO THE LION WHO DISCOVERED A DEER IN HIS HABITAT:

  GIVE HIM KETCHUP!

  Because who was knocking on my door

  After midnight

  I know it wasn’t you

  ’Cause you said:

  This is it. I am out of here. I don’t want to hear it anymore

  And I said:

  Well go. You think I care?

  Ergo I know it wasn’t you

  Needing my arms

  Or my kisses

  Not to mention my roast beef

  So who was knocking at that hour

  Last night night before

  24 robbers at my door

  I got up let them in

  Hit them in the head

  With a rolling pin

  All hid?

  And the lion pounced

  Because it was such a treat

  The chance to butcher his own meat

  Not that the zoo butcher didn’t cut a fine roast

  But hell

  He could for the first time in his life

  Do it himself

  Remember when you were learning to walk

  And your mom would hold your hand

  Remember when you started dressing yourself

  And your big sister laughed at your stripes and plaids

  Well that lion didn’t have anyone to answer to now

  But himself

  Imagine his pride when he carted dinner home

  That night

  Imagine the good good love they would make

>   While she crooned what a lion he is

  And then the zookeeper came and said:

  Deer is not good for you

  Yes, dear, she said, I am

  Pass the ketchup, Mr. Zookeeper

  You or the antelope?

  Fresher Meat, Better Tasting

  Papa John

  THE SIGNIFICANCE OF POETRY

  Poetry is as necessary

  To life

  As salt is to stew

  As garlic is to pasta

  As perfume is to summer nights

  As shaving lotion is to mornings

  As your smile is to

  My happiness

  Poetry is as significant

  To life

  As yeast is to bread

  As butter is to toast

  As grapes are to wine

  As sugar is to lemons

  How else will we get

  Lemonade

  Poetry is to me

  Your voice

  Your touch

  Your laughter

  That feeling at the end of day

  That I am

  Not alone

  NOTE TO THE SOUTH: YOU LOST

  The buzz of the flies

  Almost was a lullaby

  Rocking the dead

  To a restful place

  You couldn’t hear the ants

  Though they were

  Clearly there

  In the eyes the mouths

  Any wound or soft

  Tissue

  The worms had come

  Understanding those

  Which were not

  Trampled

  Would have a great

  Feast

  The grasses had no

  Choice but to drink

  Down the blood

  And bits of flesh

  That were ground

  Into them

  In the future

  It would be girls

  Not field rats

  Who would follow

  The soldiers

  Into the trenches

  In the future there

  Would be single

  Engine airplanes

  Dropping bombs

  And then

  In the scientific imagination

  Of the 21st century

  There would be men

  And women

  Pushing buttons

  Making war clean

  And distant

  But today

  On This battlefield

  The deadliest of This war

  The Songbirds had been

  Frightened off

  The Turkey Buzzards retreated to watch

  Deer Skunk Raccoons

  Possum Groundhogs gathered

  To let the smoke clear

  And only the moans