Declaration (Poetry Month)

By Tracy K. Smith

 

He has
               sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people
  He has plundered our—
                                            ravaged our—
                                                                        destroyed the lives of our—
  taking away our­—

                                  abolishing our most valuable—

and altering fundamentally the Forms of our—

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for
Redress in the most humble terms:
 
                                                                Our repeated
Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury.
 
We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration
and settlement here.
 
                                    —taken Captive
                                                               on the high Seas
                                                                                                      to bear—

 

 

 

from Wade in the Water, by Tracy K. Smith.  

Graywolf Press, www.graywolfpress.org, 2018