are we slaves

Us colored folk head into Valdosta,
the white folk smart enough
to cover bottle-feeding & evening chores &
dinner & not say too much
& so not too much wrong.

                        I joke about the walk from our housing
                        to the cabin, feels like going up to the Big House,
                        don’t it? Dandy & I shift registers alone, Yessir Massah
                        Dale, you an’ Miss Lillian sure are good to us!

                        They are good to us. They feed us
                        because we milk goats. We hatch chickens, we live
                        for free. Drag pasture, collect eggs, lock the duck
                        in, groom the Pyrs: for shelter and for meals and
                        for learning to do it.

We lay on concrete, facsimiles of black
death for a photo shot several times. Stand
up, say their names, go back to the farm where
Crystal has diarrhea and Cedar

needs his pus drained.

 

 

 

 

domestication debate

point: behold the viscera slapped vulva swole first freshener
           she skips the customary molasses tea for placenta pulp an
           nthwave feralcore post delivery performance piece
           hemorrhaging the maternal rage of generations
           annexed by captivity her very name an invocation of
           human sin

counterpoint: in the gated dust of her kidding pen
                      new girl and new boy aside, asleep
                      Apple chewed her afterbirth calmly

 

 

 

 

pinetta microseasons

January 1-5:
January 6-10:
January 11-15:
January 16-20:
January 21-25:
January 26-30:
January 31-February 3:
February 4:
February 5-9:
February 10-14:
February 15-19:
February 20-24:
February 25-29:
March 1-5:
March 6-10:
March 11-15:
March 16-20:
March 21-25:
March 26-30:
March 31-April 4:
April 5-9:
April 10-14:
April 15-19:
April 20-24:
April 25-29:
April 30-May 4:
May 5-9:
May 10-14:
May 15-19:
May 20-24:
May 25-29:
May 30-June 2:
June 3:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First hangovers transcended
Last does bred
Women shear each other’s hair
Old friends visit
Birthing pens bedded
Bucks egress from rut
Kumquats disappear
First kids; first stillborns
Cane toads resurface
Wild roses perfume breeze
Precocious udders fill
Splith wood is collected
Bulls regress to heat
Morning frost rescinds
Mimosa trees flower
Bucklings initiate dry-humping
Squalls threaten
Tree frogs commence night-song
Fog tightens
Kids begin to browse
Magnolia Warblers commence weeta-weeta-weeteo
Cattle egrets land
Dogfennel sprouts
Spiderwebs multiply
Chickens brood, surreptitiously
Feta culture is switched
Wheat is milled to flour
Milk yield increases
Jupiter & Neptune reach visibility
Tomatoes blush
Fire blight afflicts
Parasites leverage the rains
Last kids born out in pasture while we were off swimming at Blue Springs, found milk-shakes blissful and dragging their umbilical cords under anarms-wide elm, LaMancha babies with perfect squabby little alien ears

 

 

 

 

     

Grief

An exploded liver—too bad.
             ’Least the costs of head-butting
             are slashed by disbudding.
Something about the umbilical cord.
             Figured a vast membrane sheet
             would lend yet more subsistence
             but the doeling didn’t endure
             three full days. Did get to meet her mama.
Atlas:
             old.
Mai Mai:
             old.
The stillborns
             never knew life.
The chicken?
             Was a chicken.

 

 

 

 

Mukethe Kawinzi lives and works on a goat dairy in North Carolina.