Born in Camden, NJ, Sean Battle is the combination of an ambitious mother and WWE Pay-Per Views. He is an MFA Graduate student for poetry at Rutgers-Newark, and received his BA in English at Rutgers-New Brunswick, where he was President and Open Mic Co-host of the Verbal Mayhem Poetry Collective. Battle has released one chapbook, MID-CARDER (self-published, 2011) and is working on his first poetry CD, The Art in Smoking. Poems have been published or are forthcoming in journals Objet d Art ,Polifax, The College Journal, and Borderline, as well as the anthology Bop, Strut and Dance: a Post-Blues Form for New Generations, and have been written and performed for the Raices Cultural Center production, Spirit of the Drum: History and Evolution of a Caribbean tradition. He lives in Voorhees, NJ.

Four Poems (July 20, 2011. Issue 29.)

On the Way

On the way to Jersey Ave,
I would pass him. Half- gray locs,
good leg stretched out like a
beggar's hand, highlighting
the missing ligament on his
left side. When I had it,

a dollar or two would go to him.
But this was the first two days
I would see him on the way
to my Afro-Cuban arts internship
in a cultural center stationed
at a warehouse tucked beneath
the so-called filth, many inhabitants
legally stiff armed from voting.

We were a group of dancers and singers
swinging body parts to Bomba drums
to where we switched to Rumba and Orisha
cause everyone was getting bored, but knew

there were children out there
who needed these songs, many
wearing skin color of ancestors
who made these tools of movement
with empty barrels, smuggling
culture into oppression.

We all complained about this city.
How no one will come to us
cause of the bad parking
and Crime Alerts unreported
by Rutgers Eden emails.

But a family or two
do bring their kids
to dance and music class
every once in awhile.
That's enough for me to keep
paying cab and gas money
to, as one of the directors would say,
sweat like a farm animal, as we chanted
and danced to deities we've only
begun to understand, hoping

the amputated man
with half gray locs
will understand why
my gaze escapes him,
be it turning my head
or crossing the street.

My Thinking Man Statue Speaks

Two hours before Christmas day,
your mother let you choose one of two
gifts under the tree. Judging from shape
it wasn't a DVD for the PS3 now
collecting dust. Rather, it was my
bronze skin coiled by my own arms,
head tucked in.. You yanked the
bubble plastic off as Mom woke her smile
out of its sleep, grateful for the new
shoes Auntie got for her in your name.
The crust in its eyes were wiped
only when that beaming smirk of your's
took a look at my detail. She spoke of my
meaning as her fingers traced muscle
lining, highlighting seriousness she felt
you had gained over the years. I am here
to celebrate that recent growth, to be
set on the dresser drawer as you smile
still. This was not some video game
played for only a few days before
Spring semester started, or some
action figure you played with while
the new toy smell faded. I am your new
window, your pep talk to keep going,
cause your mother, if no one else,
recognizes how much sleep you've
lost equals to how much you'll give
this world. But first, you must complete
this pose I'm doing. Yes, you're already
naked in beliefs. Yes you have strength
behind this sculpted flexing. But your form
is off in the arms. Should be hugging
your shoulders a lot tighter, till you think
and cry yourself into an eight hour coma.
You deserve at least that much rest.

The Bartender is a Weapon's Dealer

Look; Normally, I mind my own business.
But this the fifth time this week now
your eyes dripped rum on my bar stool.
So for my sanity's sake, please take my advice
for the next time. Okay, turn your house

into an interrogation room. Just you
and the inmate whose cup bled grape juice
on furniture you're still paying for.
I understand she was excited
you was home from work, but your
last name alone should teach her that
you, Detective Stabler, enable her the right
to receive stinging slaps swirled around
cuss words, your face red as blood
left a crime scenes.

Now if your wife wants to jump in, I say
let her land face first right on your fist.
Didn't she try to divorce you last year anyway ?
ahhh but that pension was too tempting to leave.
Now she refusing her order to remain silent.
My man, that gives you the right to be violent.

But what do I know; I'm just a bartender.
Tending to tender souls hiding behind
them badges. pouring poison

into your bodies. Figured I'd be
thorough and serve shots to your
shattered soul before you go back
to helping special victims.

or at least help families pretend
to gain closure in the court room,
forever guessing the volume
Of their daughter's final screams
in-between forced pelvic thrust.

Your family can't comprehend the stress from that
and from interrogating madmen playing mind games
with the same stone cold eyes used to scold victims
whose breasts they cut off as a sign of control.

and I know you wish to do
the same with his balls.

Come home, hoping to avoid
awkward dinner table talk about
your day. what they expect you say,
well honey, I got Leads on a rape
with a victim Lillie's age
pass the butter please. *

What good is it both of you not sleeping
at night, her mad for your daughter
cause this world is full of predators,
you being mad at your daughter
cause she spilled juice all over what's
chomping away on your income,
while your wife think something going on
between you and your partner Benson.

Honestly, you've stabled
their suburban lives by fighting
an urban war where no one wins,
yet they couldn't follow your
one order to keep the house
spotless? Fuck that. Back them
up against the wall like the perps
they are; raping your bank account
and patience.

That way, when my wife
jogs late at night through
Central park, I'll feel better
knowing that when I'm unable
to protect her ,you, Detective
Stabler, Mr. family man, can
pick up the slack. But of course,

that last call
is your's to pour.

* Italicized portion paraphrased from an episode of Law and Order SVU.

Diet of an SVU Detective

Even after ten years of knowing
chicken wings, fried rice and shrimp
don't mix too well with corpses drenched
in blood and cum, I still chow down to suffocate
my first case in this unit, framed by a photo

on the murderer's living room table.
A little girl. Flashing a sweet smile in her Mary costume.
Dad being the biggest little lamb she would know.
Only on Halloween would she have such power,
and intuition told me

he was aroused by the domination factor.
Now this picture is a blueprint for how
clean she had to look for the funeral. Just like
when her Daddy polished images dirtied
by secrets crawling between parted pubic hairs.
Innocence stolen under her mother's
bat-eared nose.

But it was when I first asked myself ,
what decent broad that sick in the brain
to let a man cheat on her with someone
genetically half the woman she is,

that it all started. The bubbling SWAT team
with a warrant on my throat, something we cops
are trained to expunge from our records.
Can't have our vomit blending in
with the crime scene now, can we.

Honestly, I could've gone
a lot farther in making sure
I ate better. My body may be
a muscled toothpick, sculpted
from years of chasing down
potential perps through
Manhattan,

but half of that fat fades
from years of sweating it off
while nighmare-ing about
my daughters laying around
yellow tape, panties shredded,
thighs dripping boys who heard no.

Go through that for ten years.
You'll appreciate a corona or two
and greasy Chinese food
snapping necks of enough
brain cells to bury immediate
knowledge of closed cases.
Too bad it's nothing more

than a balancing act. You want
to forget completely. But something
feels too monster-like about standing
amongst forensics canvassing a rapist's
idea of masterpiece, knowing a mother
only pulled the trigger when he
tried to kill them both,

and no longer struggling
to keep anything down.