Joy Harjo - By The Way (for Adrienne Rich)

I’ve given it time, as if time were mine to give.

There was a dam, larger than Hoover or the President or the patent

For the metal creature that sucks up all the dust.

Words had to stop and ask permission before crossing over.

Oh, sometimes they were wild with the urgency of sweet

And leaped—

Mostly the rest were kept in the net

Of swallowed or forbidden language.

I want to go back and rewrite all the letters.

I lied frequently.

No. I was not O.K.

And neither was James Baldwin, though his es...