marcella durand
*
A Tripod Construction
As the highway surrounds us so does traffic sound surround and so I am
surrounded by husband care husbanding us both me and son now sleeping so he
was a surprise and husbanded we sleep as wind carries sound surrounding us wind
carries through window and even protective gate and screen—there are three
layers to our window: screen, glass, and gate, as there are three of us, a tripod
construction of family or as my son’s history and my history say: famille. My
husband might be French or he might be German or he might be Italian or he
might be Native American or he might be Blackfoot or he might be pied noir. Not
like me, French, and not like my son, French, not like my son, Senegalese, and
not like my son or me, now New Yorker, now African American. Like all of us
New Yorker African American French Native American. Whatever we are we
will be confused and so will everyone who speaks to us and whether the traffic
sound highway wakes us up filtering and the people speaking outside and the
telephone and the beeping and honking and bicycle chain dragging and the small
indefinable noise that wakes us up as the city surrounds us as people around us as
we husbanded wake. As we enter the wake, unhusbanded, confused, unique.
surrounded by husband care husbanding us both me and son now sleeping so he
was a surprise and husbanded we sleep as wind carries sound surrounding us wind
carries through window and even protective gate and screen—there are three
layers to our window: screen, glass, and gate, as there are three of us, a tripod
construction of family or as my son’s history and my history say: famille. My
husband might be French or he might be German or he might be Italian or he
might be Native American or he might be Blackfoot or he might be pied noir. Not
like me, French, and not like my son, French, not like my son, Senegalese, and
not like my son or me, now New Yorker, now African American. Like all of us
New Yorker African American French Native American. Whatever we are we
will be confused and so will everyone who speaks to us and whether the traffic
sound highway wakes us up filtering and the people speaking outside and the
telephone and the beeping and honking and bicycle chain dragging and the small
indefinable noise that wakes us up as the city surrounds us as people around us as
we husbanded wake. As we enter the wake, unhusbanded, confused, unique.
*
Marcella Durand is the author of two new collections, published this year: Traffic & Weather from Futurepoem Books and AREA from Belladonna Books. She lives in NYC with her husband and son.
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