Art and poetry on page and stage
14
John Godfrey
Civ Dis
Watch you don’t step
on my shine, punk
Between my elbowsand my glasses
is No-Fly
Between my fly
and my thigh
is outer-space capsule
You just be quiet to we
.
Hanging ’ffense, mon cul
.
To all non-binary guerilla cadres:
His gender mind’s
a scant two inches
To all multi-maroon intransigent cliques:
His color lacks obedience
To all fernhead body-downs:
Lay them down
on denialers’ werewolf
Ain’t no living wage
in Armor Garden
Ironic camouflage is our exposition
Subvertationist catwalk knows time
.
Observe without you hide
Change mode of muck wash
.
Can’t predict change
So change like it’s yours to do
Them who back walk
don’t see the curtain drops
Don’t see the separated
baby head ain’t Martian
.
Them who back walk:
Stay in their way
John Godfrey was born in Massena, N.Y. in 1945. He is the author of 14 collections of poetry. He received an A.B. from Princeton University in 1967, and took a B.S. in Nursing from Columbia University in 1994. He has received fellowships from the General Electric Foundation (1984), the Foundation for Contemporary Arts (2009), and the Z Foundation (2013). He retired in 2011 after 17 years as a nurse clinician in HIV/AIDS. He has lived in the East Village of Manhattan since the 1960s.