Manuela Cardiga - Guilty Pleasures and Culinary Treasures

BABEL SHOULD BE SEEN,
NOT HEARD


i have been
drawing
sketching
doodling
kaleidoscoping
black faces
all my life

beautiful
hideous,
loving
hateful
kind
threatening
heart-rending

face after face
an endless parade
a race to unfold
dark power
opening
in smooth slick spill
oily ink on the
whitest empty page

i think i will
single them out
one by one
fill each page
with one face
coming
out of the dark

would you like to play
the analysis game?
make the complex plain
give the thing a name?

shall we say:
the subconscious fear
of a white child in Africa?
fearful fascination
with the forbidden?
a gulp of guilt?

or is it just
the worse of all:

simplest
unexplainable magic
summoned faces
from the past
slivers of the future
peeking through
shattered barriers

magic spray-painted
in blood on brain
on the only cavern
inside which
we still cower
freeing the ghosts
planting strange flowers
or giving birth
to a multitude
destined to build
mythic towers


MC