Free Nelson Mandella
(MON)
Harry Belafonte’s voice comes over
the Colorado Zephyr air waves yelling
“Is anybody out there?
Can any one hear me?
Is any one listening?
To a 1960’s movie
where he is the last black man
on earth, co-starring Inger Stevens.
“Free Nelson Mandela,” he yells,
“Nelson Mandela has been
a political prisoner for
the past twenty-five years
in a South African jail.”
Then Ziggy Marley sings an up
tempo reggae tune asking,
“Tomorrow people where is your best?
“Tomorrow people how long may you last?”
Suddenly I’m trans---ported to
The State University of New York at Albany
I’m in the library reading
the only book by the poet Lyn Lifshin
I can find written through
the eyes of Blue Seneca Indians
waiting for a Bob Marley
concert without Bob Marley
just the wailers
I’m with Touloose
as usual and I say,
“I really wish you were a girl.”
(I’m tired of being alone in a crowd.)
(I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired.)
I’m suddenly jolted back to reality, back into
my own political exile.
I think of Nelson Mandela languishing
in prison all the time
I was a spoiled young man
skiing all over America.
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