Night, Death, Mississippi
by Robert Hayden
  

I.

  
A quavering cry. Screech-owl?  
Or one of them?  
The old man in his reek  
and gauntness laughs –  
   
One of them, I bet – 5
and turns out the kitchen lamp,  
limping to the porch to listen  
in the windowless night.  
   
Be there with Boy and the rest  
if I was well again. 10
Time was. Time was.  
White robes like moonlight  
   
In the sweetgum dark.  
Unbucked that one then  
He hawks and spits, 15
fevered as by groinfire.  

 
Time was. A cry?  
A cry all right.  
   
Have us a bottle,  
Boy and me – 20
he’s earned him a bottle –  
when he gets home.  
   

II.

  
Then we beat them, he said,  
beat them till our arms was tired  
and the big old chains 25 
messy and red.  
   
O Jesus burning on the lily cross  
   
Christ, it was better  
than hunting bear  
which don’t know why 30 
you want him dead.  
   
O night, rawhead and bloodybones night  
   
You kids fetch Paw  
some water now so’s he  
can wash that blood 35
off him, she said.  
   
O night betrayed by darkness not its own  
   
 
white robes — The standard uniform of the Ku Klux Klan was white robes and hoods.
 

sweetgum — a deciduous tree (Liquidambar styraciflua) common in the American south named for its sweet sap
 
Unbucked — castrated
 
groinfire— lust, sexual arousal