SPLIT THIS ROCK: Poems of Provocation & Witness Tanya Snyder   DIPLOMAT It’s not your fault. There was no way to know. Helicopters buzzing over- zealously, my money bleeding the country- side, my scalp hanging on some guerrilla bedpost. And so, just because you live so north my head cranes like the front row at the movies; just because you are the queen bee and I am down here drowning in your honeyed hive; just because from here your diamonds are the stars we pray to doesn’t mean that you are complicit doesn’t mean that this is your fault. On the angled highways, On the twisting stairs, On the city blocks pressed up against each other with only streets between, we shake our teeth in jars and lie back as the sky forecasts our future, as the clouds like tealeaves tell stories until the teacup turns over and scalds us below. And I may come home, teeth shaking, head still stuck south, fingers still trembling, stupidly, or I may not come home, and this, we knew, was the risk we ran. And it might soothe you to know that this was not your fault, that I was not your problem, that you may proceed as you have without failure or caution, without the benedictions of the bishops or the tears of their surviving parishioners. With the yellow beasts in your own dreams, the firm mattress beneath you and your head all night spinning on your softest pillow, you may continue with the enchanting horror of this beautiful country buried so many miles beneath you, you may continue, rolling on and on through your dreams, your painted skies, and your horrible beautiful countryside, sad, but satisfied.     Tanya Snyder is a freelance journalist and Latin America solidarity activist. This is the second time her poetry has appeared in Beltway. She is on the Split This Rock Coordinating Committee.   Published in Volume 9, Number 1, Winter 2008. Read more by this author: Tanya Snyder: Evolving City Issue