Wind in a Box

—after Lorca

I want to always sleep beneath a bright red blanket

of leaves. I want to never wear a coat of ice.

I want to learn to walk without blinking.

I want to outlive the turtle and the turtle’s father,

the stone. I want a mouth full of permissions

and a pink glistening bud. If the wildflower and ant hill

can return after sleeping each season, I want to walk

out of this house wearing nothing but wind.

I want to greet you, I want to wait for the bus with you

weighing less than a chill. I want to fight off the bolts

of gray lighting the alcoves and winding paths

of your hair. I want to fight off the damp nudgings

of snow. I want to fight off the wind.

I want to be the wind and I want to fight off the wind

with its sagging banner of isolation, its swinging

screen doors, its gilded boxes, and neatly folded pamphlets

of noise. I want to fight off the dull straight lines

of two by fours and endings, your disapprovals,

your doubts and regulations, your carbon copies.

If the locust can abandon its suit,

I want a brand new name. I want the pepper’s fury

and the salt’s tenderness. I want the virtue

of the evening rain, but not its gossip.

I want the moon’s intuition, but not its questions.

I want the malice of nothing on earth. I want to enter

every room in a strange electrified city

and find you there. I want your lips around the bell of flesh

at the bottom of my ear. I want to be the mirror,    

but not the nightstand. I do not want to be the light switch.

I do not want to be the yellow photograph

or book of poems. When I leave this body, Woman,

I want to be pure flame. I want to be your song.

Terrance Hayes

born in Columbia, South Carolina, earned his BA from Coker College and MFA from the University of Pittsburgh. His poetry explores race, masculinity, music, and pop culture, often using inventive forms. In a 2013 interview, he described striving for language that communicates emotion like music does—purely and powerfully.

Hayes is the author of several acclaimed collections, including So to Speak (2023), American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin (2018), and Lighthead (2010), which won the National Book Award. His work frequently appears in Best American Poetry and has earned Pushcart Prizes.

He also wrote two books of criticism: Watch Your Language (2023), a finalist for the Pegasus Award, and To Float in the Space Between (2018), which won that award. Hayes has received a MacArthur Fellowship and taught at several universities. He currently teaches creative writing at NYU.