No Complaints

(For Gwendolyn Brooks, 1917—2001)

maybe there is something about the seventh of June: Gwen,
Prince and me . . . or maybe people just have to be born at some
time . . . and there are only three hundred sixty-five days or three
sixty-six every four years or so . . . meaning that some things
happen at the same time in the same rising sign . . . and the same
houses in Gemini . . . but some of us might also consider the
possibility of reincarnating revolving restructuring that spirit . . .
reshaping that spirit . . . releasing that spirit . . . tucking the use-
less inside and when the useless pushes out again we restructure
again and poetry and song and praisesong go on . . . because it is
the right thing to do

we always will cry when a great heart . . . a good soul . . . one of
the premier poets of her age restructures . . . reincarnates . . .
revolves into a resolve that we now carry in our hearts . . . as all
great women and men are alive . . . not by biology but remem-
brance . . . and that’s all right . . . as the old folk say . . . because as
long as they stay on the lips . . . they nestle in our hearts and those
souls which are planted . . . continue growing . . . until generations
not knowing their touch . . . their voice . . . or even the fact
that some Chicago poets are terrible cooks . . . but always fun
to eat with . . . will tell tales of having met someone who knew
someone who once watched a basketball game . . . in which some
Chicago poet cheered for Seattle at the request of some Virginia
poet who wanted more games . . . while Mr. Blakely was amazed
that a Chicago poet was even watching a game . . . and didn’t
we miss him as he slipped away watching baseball . . . and what
a way to go . . . though we then did sort of know . . . that once
gone . . . he would call the woman he loved

and so we come to no more phone calls at six a.m. to chat ...
and no more Benihana when we are all in New York . . . and no
more gossiping and questioning and trying to make sense of a
senseless world . . . no more face-to-face . . . only the poetry which
is a great monument from this Topeka daughter to the world . . .
and yet . . . there can be no complaints in this passing . . . no
sorrow songs . . . no if onlys . . . it is all here: the work the love:
the woman: who gave and gave and gave . . . no complaints of too
long or too hard . . . no injustice of accident or misunderstanding
of disease . . . just one great woman moving to the next phase . . .
and us on the ground . . . giving Alleluias