My Dark Man by Ravi Singh

    ​  Ernesto De Quesada CC


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My Dark Man

my dark man
burrows beneath these pages
like onyx in white coal
in my 20's I was a shaman
and he was just common
in my 30's he was welder and impresario
I was a curandero in the barrio
in my 40's we faced off
where the tundra meets the settlements
and shook hands
nothing needed to be said
so we talked about New York sports teams
how they're earnest but not hungry
then we stepped into each other
one for the ages
now I don't have to lug around
a canteen of flame retardant
and he doesn't have to worry
about pretending to be someone
he's not.


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Ravi Singh (nee Neil Hackman) studied with Ted Berrigan and was editor of Out There Magazine in Chicago in the 70’s. He is Author of the novel Ivar & Freddie vs. the Lizards (White Lion Press 2003). Most recently he was published in Dispatches from the Poetry Wars and is Author (with Ana Brett) of The Kundalini Yoga Book - Life in the Vast Lane (raviana productions 2018).