Broken

There is something

we don’t like to talk about

perhaps we already know

even if we let the monster out

change will remain the same

It’s been this way a while now

I scream—

—you shout

‘til there’s nothing left but silence…

hurt feelin’

we’re bruised and wounded

each other trying to out trump the other

reneging—inventing and preventing truth

patience raised into violence

because we’re broken

this is how we mend ourselves—kintsugi

but we gonna remember what we remember

and you will fight to shift the blame

‘til all that’s left is smoke and embers

‘less some hot breather stokes the flames

leaving us choked and blinded

gasping to breathe—dying to see

We’ve seen it every time

and pay it no mind

this red and blue sea

filled with blood and tears

hatred and love

between you and me

holding hands like lovers—your hand in mine

too afraid of letting the other go

walking down the same road

just with opposite dreams—

we mended pottery.

Truth [not a haiku]

truth—a fruit so sweet

Should never be withheld until it is profitable

water in a desert—truth!

The dying need the truth

If I am going to heaven let it not be on a bed of lies

And if to hell—there I will need more truth to wipe my brow

Let me panic—at least I will breathe a little

more.

When your faith is hi-jacked by politics you should ask yourself what party was your Creator in—not the one you put him in, but the one your creator registered into…

Black In America

My voice has no volume

for how loud my spirit wants to cry

In this vacuum

Where if I raise my voice I am unheard

And if I breathe I die—

On Independence

What it means to me in 2020 :

I would submit that to seek independence is to fight for it, not simply for individual-self, but for all who aim in the same goal and cause. To fight for it and then celebrate in victory while others audience in suffrage is to become as those once fought against.

The conscience of the nation must be roused [Frederick Douglass] from a fanciful dream rendered a reality at this moment; for even if one citizen under a banner of freedom who suffers in voicelessness, from inequitable rights and opportunities (economically, educationally, environmentally, etc.), or that the laws set forth to govern all is perceived bias on the scales of justice, how then can independence be celebrated by all denizens. And I choose the word denizen over citizens for there was a time during the fight of American independence where the slave was categorized as less than human [chattel] despite anatomical likeness.

When pressed with the notion of the progress our nation has made, I submit that the speed of progress is relative to the oppressed and suppressed; for that chronometer does not measure in the same way as that of cruelty. Perhaps we should measure the speed at which the founders achieved their goal in achieving their dreams we now celebrate versus the swiftness its descendants has balanced the scales that it measures equal for all despite race, creed, gender, and all that makes us diverse yet the same unified under the same pledge in the pursuit of freedom.

While I proudly think of independence and my service to its continuum, I would be remiss in not recognizing the uncalibrated scale that results in the unfair pricing of freedom.

Disclaimer: I express as a private and legitimate citizen, and not from that of a position afforded me by the institution for which I now serve. The above views are my own and are not in commission by any organization or institution.

Racism

Politicians saying there isn’t systematic racism in America is like having a knee on my throat while stating I have rights—America is a system with racism in it, to continue to dismiss this problem is to be complicit in its cruelty.

Protest

Kneeling

Ain’t

Kneeing

Inequality

When an oppressor dictates

how the oppressed can and should protest

it is apparent equality or freedom does not exist

This is the oppressor’s proverbial knee

pressed firmly upon the throat of the people

And any who supports oppression is an oppressor

Haiku #484: Gasp!

Arrival—inhale!

Wind laden with love and pain

Exhale—departed!

Breathing should be an inalienable right to all; it—breath—should not be pleaded for, nor withheld as a means to demonstrate power over another.

Haiku #483

Soul, a screaming pond.

Struggling for a way out,

—How am I not George

Everyday I wake up with a tinge of fear that it may be my last simply because my skin remembers the long history of insensibility—it, my skin, has been an excusable causality for unjustified violence…