Common Pokeweed, Pokeberry, Pokeroot, Inkberry, Poke

Joseph Heithaus

Phytolacca americana

After elder and mullen and pokeweed,
He writes, A child said, what is the grass?
and after, young Whitman begins to guess:
itself a child?, handkerchief of the Lord?

It's in "Song of Myself," composed in ink
made, I'd guess, of the weed's berries, purple-
black, clustered under leaves, lush and supple.
Isn't that the way the poet should sing?

Scratching poison onto a pulpy sheet,
finger's stained with what was drooping flower,
then fruit and seed, toxic, cruel, ruthless,
words that won't let up, grass and grain he'll press
for years, its leaves turned over and over
to speak the world-parsnips, pismire, stomach's pit.