With My Beloved Poem by Frank Bana

I pray with my beloved
She is the moon in whom I disappear
Men of evil may kill her
And the beauty of her children
And gun down the mourners at her funeral
And the taut spirit in me –
So I love her in this moment
Against the murders of that day
When the centuries’ chain of anguish
Will be dragged across the backs
Of the suffering, toiling prisoners here.

If I wake tomorrow and find her taken
If I wake to receive the news of her murder
I will confront her assassins
I will haunt their souls
With the intensity of all they are obsessed to destroy
I will use the weapon
Of the faith that she planted in me.

My thoughts become hers’
In this hour of the serious part of night
And I visit the place
Where strength and survival are renewed
And technology is democratized
And the fruits of nature are harvested
For our delight
For our tenderness
For our fertility
For our freedom, brief, from fear.

To all the men
Who murdered us one in three:
I see you now
Bringing slaughter upon the homes of my beloved.
You see what you do.
I wrestle with my hatred.
You are nothing to forgive.


(“It is an easy thing to rejoice in the tents of prosperity;
Thus could I sing and thus rejoice; but it is not so with me”
William Blake)