Playground Basketball, Durham
Black arms unfold
sinews taught with glistening skin.
The man strains for the globe, draws breath
and flies.
The woman, waiting to be seen
in painted jeans and gold-braid hair,
She is a queen, a mighty queen.
This is her court,
someday she’ll judge the Seraphim.
But today the Angels’ flaming swords and unfurled wings
flash above the rim of Earth;
the man falls to the ground, and dies
the woman feels the pain of birth.