Alfonso Stands Answerable
My people, you were really something fucking fine
on the morning of first arrests:
our men, once frightened, bound to their beds, now stand up like human masts—
deafness passes through us like a police whistle.
Here then I
testify:
each of us
comes home, shouts at a wall, at a stove, at a refrigerator, at himself. Forgive me, I
was not honest with you,
life—
to you I stand answerable.
I run etcetera with my legs and my hands etcetera I run down Vasenka Street etcetera—
Whoever listens:
thank you for the feather on my tongue,
thank you for our argument that ends, thank you for deafness,
Lord, such fire
from a match you never lit.
—Ilya Kaminsky
—found in Deaf Republic (2019)