The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You, poem 3

He told me now you mean to sit there and he had him a pistol too and tell me you don’t
remember me he pulled down his bottom lip
with his finger I saw the gold tooth with the star of David in it
he spit the tobacco juice out between his teeth he reared back he said woowee
boy and I remembered it was a long time ago I was a baby I was
drifting away in a washtub tied to the raft the cottonmouths was crawling
up through the willow limbs there was a dark face above and black hands
grabbed a hold of me the negro swam a long way with me in his arms
he always smiled there was the star in his tooth we got to the bank he cut
a X in my foot with his razor he said this hurts me more
than it does you white baby he was biting the bottom of my foot he was
spitting the moccasin juice and the blood on the ground all the while
him swatting things jumping out on him and the gold tooth
with the star of David in it I was trying to catch a butterfly
then he started cutting on himself he kept a saying woowee
just like mosquitoes he picked me up I sat on his shoulders we ran
through the bogue we ran through timber all the time I’m riding up high
on his shoulders bouncing he wasn’t no horse. . .

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