Tucker Lieberman

Dogon Standing Man*

The tube of fire in his collar grazes hair,
Awakens skin. The swarming urgency of power
Masses here: the junction of the when and where,
Coitus of shamanic head and sacred hour.

Out of the old man's mouth, with rail arms raised, surprise
Shrieks out in yellow tigerflies. Savage wails
Tail close behind. The sky has struck him with her cries!
Her spirit casts her female energy in male.

Age has torn his navel from its wooden strata.
Patience dwells in the deep blue progenitor's beyond.
Each scarred, incanted finger rattles,
Every limb a symbol, lungs enlarged in song.

 

*Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC

 

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