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Cadillac Moon

By Kevin Young b. 1970 Kevin Young

Crashing

again—Basquiat

sends fenders

& letters headlong

into each other

the future. Fusion.

AAAAAAAAAAA.

Big Bang. The Big

Apple, Atom's

behind him—

no sirens

in sight. His career

of careening

since—at six—

playing stickball

a car stole

his spleen. Blind

sided. Move

along folks—nothing

to see here. Driven,

does two Caddys

colliding, biting

the dust he's begun

to snort. Hit

& run. Red

Cross—the pill-pale

ambulance, inside

out, he hitched

to the hospital.

Joy ride. Hot

wired. O the rush

before the wreck—

each Cadillac,

a Titanic,

an iceberg that's met

its match—cabin

flooded

like an engine,

drawing even

dark Shine

from below deck.

FLATS FIX. Chop

shop. Body work

while-u-wait. In situ

the spleen

or lien, anterior view—

removed. Given

Gray's Anatomy

by his mother for recovery—

151. Reflexion of spleen

turned forwards

& to the right, like

pages of a book—

Basquiat pulled

into orbit

with tide, the moon

gold as a tooth,

a hubcap gleaming,

gleaned—Shine

swimming for land,

somewhere solid

to spin his own obit.

Source: To Repel Ghosts (Zoland Books, 2001)

Biography

Three of Kevin Young’s books form what he calls “an American trilogy”: To Repel Ghosts (2001), which explores the paintings of Jean-Michel Basquiat; Jelly Roll (2003), a collection of blues poems; and Black Maria (2005), a film noir. His first book of poetry, Most Way Home (1995), was selected for the National Poetry Series by Lucille Clifton, who describes the collection as re-creating “an inner history which is compelling and . . .

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