Ode to Kehinde Wiley’s Rumors of War, by Greg Shaw

Rumors of War, by Kehinde Wiley (USA) 2019. Photos by Greg Shaw.

Ode to Kehinde Wiley’s Rumors of War
 
I took a room on 10th Avenue
to be near, to witness
a majestic statue’s final days in New York City 
 
Atop his pedestal, a resistant young man 
astride a powerful steed
silhouetted and sanctified by neon, in Times Square.
 
Kehinde formed this statue 
Now it redirects a path for us below 
 
The rumors of war – they are rumors no more
They surround and suffocate 
 
On the statue’s stoop, I sit with a cigarette-smoking Spiderman
Still costumed after posing for Instagram
 
All around giant LED screens, the city’s sirens
The sounds of slurring voices
Heads hovering over smartphones
 
Your silence resounds.
 
The cranes are coming 
to remove you to Virginia
 
Tonight the city’s snow stains your shoulders, 
and the “good” people on both sides
 
Look up: an ad’s half-clothed model, “queen of holiday parties”
Listen: the haunting whisper of a coy passerby, “cocaine?”
 
It’s the wee hours now, the cranes are coming
To remove you to Virginia
 
To take you to Richmond
To take you to Richmond
 
See that you are not troubled
 
Removal crews have arrived
The machinery is in place.
 
Your rebellious gaze looks West
Over proud shoulders, a warrior’s pose 
 
In New York you welcomed shoppers
In Richmond, Lee and Traveller
 
Auden asks us to consider Henry James, 
who upon observing Monument Avenue 
wrote of melancholy, a bereft image, an infelicitous look
 
Tomorrow you decamp, South
Past capitols, the Mason-Dixon
Charlottesville and The Wilderness
 
Which is more welcoming, Times Square or where you ride?
Which is more prepared – horse or rider?
 
Say your name.
 
Are you seething or are you seeking?
Are you preaching or are you teaching?
 
for all these things must come to pass
 
Like Lee’s lieutenants you’ve left before dawn
for Richmond – Virginia.
 
But the end is not yet

Greg Shaw

Greg Shaw is a former journalist, co-author of several works of nonfiction on technology and the future (Harper Business and Columbia University), and a poetry student of Frances McCue, founder of Hugo House in Seattle, Washington. He is founder of Clyde Hill Publishing.