Vèvè

Kamau Brathwaite

1.
But on the beach
the fisherman’s net is completed;
the fine webs fell softly,

sand shifting under his walking;
the water is ready;
twined spray through the air

and the seine holds the sun
and the line in his hand
tightens steady.

The net drifted downward,
through tides and reversals
of shell-clinking water,

through time and the hopes
that were drowned in the deep
sleeping sound of the bay.

The fan sifted slowly
through cobwebs of light
catching softly the moons of his green
spreading opening day

2.
And so the black eye travels to the brink of vision
but not yet;
hold back the fishnet’s fling of morn-
ing; unloose the sugarcane;
my spattered breast must undertake one more incision;
cut, carve, dissect
the merchant’s pound of flesh, the soldier’s pawn
of violence, the preacher’s hymn of pain.

The black eye travels to the brink of vision:
look, the fields are wet,
the sea sits gentle on the dawn
of sand; but voices fill the green with hurricane.

And yet it is what happens
it is what happens
when they fall:

conquerors, helmets, plumes,
unloosened knots
of blood, dried river beds of iron,
rust;

it is the bird that sings,
the green that wavers, wavers, wins
the slave rebellion of the rot
of dust

that matters;
it is this that glitters
in the salt
lagoon,
that crusts the coral
with foundation stone,
that stirs the resurrection
out of Tacky’s bones.

3.
So on this ground,
write;
within the sound
of this white limestone vèvè,

talk
of the empty roads,
vessels of your head,
claypots, shards, ruins.

And on this sailing ground,
sprinkled with rum, bitten
with the tenor of your open wound,
walk

walk
the hooves will come, welcomed
by drumbeats, into your ridden head;
and the horse, cheval of the dead,
charade of la mort,

tongued with the wind
possession of the fire
possession of the dust
sundered from your bone
plundered from my breast
by ice, by chain, by sword, by the cast wind,
surrenders up to you the graven Word
carved from Olodumare
from Ogun of Alare, from Ogun of Onire
from Shango broom of thunder and Damballa Grand Chemin.

For on this ground
trampled with the bull’s swathe of whips
where the slave at the crossroads was a red anthill
eaten by moonbeams, by the holy ghosts
of his wounds

the Word becomes
again a god and walks among us;
look, here are his rags,
here is his crutch and his satchel
of dreams; here is his hoe and his rude implements

on this ground
on this broken ground.

Fonte (Parte 3, v. 1-5 e 33-34): Pereira, E. A., org. 2010. Um tigre na floresta de signos. BH, Maza. Poema publicado em livro em 1969.