Open Mouth

When the factory workers
lifted Yevgeny Yevtushenko
onto a workbench to read his poetry,
no one made them turn their machines off,
but they did and then filled the air
with their own words alongside his.

When Ken Saro-Wiwa died
against pollution and exploitation
no one came to his death reading without
carrying a scream with them.

When Federico Garcia Lorca died his blood
made the whole landscape his poem, echoing
longer than the rifles could ever hope to do.

Tonight, you open your mouth
and hope the moths in there
don’t fly out into a dark room,
but you’ve forgotten that it’s your job
to light the lamp.

Nothing is owed to you.
You owe so much.
Remember those machines clunking
to a stop. Remember those bullets
clunking to a stop. Remember
those words that are today remembered
not because they were uttered in silence,
but because they found their own way
amidst the noises of life, and followed it
no matter where it led.