David L. Hatton Poems

Dred Scott, Dred Scott!
What is truth, and what is not?
Do the Justices agree?
In your skin of ebony
...

She is woman... and much abused:
Her lovely womb and breasts and buttocks were infused
With sordid meaning, twisted thought,
By vain imagination packaged, sold, and bought.
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Our grieving father Abraham — of faithful hearts the head —
Had bargained for a Hittite cave where he could place his dead,
His spouse and sister Sarah, who was partner in God's will
To bring the promised blessing, which their Offspring would fulfill.
...

If you can stay a virgin, while all about you,
Others toy with sex, and play that game without you;
If tempted just as friends are on the campus scene,
You don’t give in, but keep your heart and body clean;
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Paint clouds that really rain
And noisy, running streams,
Or birds that can take flight
And sing beyond your dreams,
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I sing the body immortal,
inborn longing, reflexive wish, certain vision
of flesh immune to death's decay and death.
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Grief is the stretch beyond the pain,
A long and bitter-sweet refrain.

I trace again a trail we walked,
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The growth of our dreams
and our ambitious schemes
To accomplish still more as we age
Are proof, while alive,
...