Primus
by David Lawrence Cade

He offered a credo, a mind satisfied too,
Careful and particular, strictly ventured


Captive volume of books to gather facts from
The prime vertical circle, 
Or one on parallel with it ­
Primus
It has ripened in the sun


Next, in a peculiar sense, the secret of true freedom
There is a mystery, a panoply around him
A fixed rhythmic concerted ice
Dechaining,
His country is nothing by slush
His is tired of watching and waiting


It is rare, it is sufficient to be the first
No longer burdened of the barest necessities of life
They begin drifting in ice
The deportees
The blood-stained leaves of their lives
Evermore assembled in sealed folders
Denials primitive ­ officials signing off
After the successful hunt and hearty meal
On travellers, much quoted, graphic


Arise and give me the wind
Give me the breeze ­
I will come to the edge of this terrestrial psyche,
This mirror.


Let America’s stomach cover itself.
It is obese on the victims of the Patriots Act.
Let the leaves be covered with their clotted blood
While sent to another country to be tortured.
America has buried the rights of detainees
In  its stomach.


Upon whom shall we slip off our shoes,
Our moratorium, our amnesty,
Our commutation?
Toward the crescent they shall always
Slip off their shoes.
It has been said of this nation.


The wind of outrage now commences to sing
The doctrine of international justice now commences to sing
The harp strung with the hope of those
Deprived of their rights now commences to sing


The future stretches before him -
Before the land snatches him away ­
The first wind 
      now is thundering
The climate of no accountability
      now is thundering


come the myriad-legged circle of voices
the circle will come and wrap itself
around the crescent
the circle will come running
the subject is tyranny 
and overmustering arrogance of an athletic regime
and the attempts of its victims to free themselves


it is not a little valley that is spoken of
it is toward the bend in the river
toward the little cell
where they shall direct their footsteps
it is from the beginning of myth time ­
all those little agents flying about


they are just sleeping on bare skin ­
the people think detention is always calm
that the detainees will always be fortunate
as if they are just enjoying water lilies
for a short time ­
like an endangered bear feeding on water lilies
and about to be killed by the hunter who lies in ambush
as our rights have been ambushed


it is primus, the first of the ten,
the dance of many,
held where not even their first sound on awakening
in a prison can echo without being heard
by this speaker of tales
who knows
of the drowned person who almost ran out of the water
who had fallen, pushed off the branch 
on which he was perched
Primus