Tag Archives: humanity

She’s Crying

03 Sunday Sep 2017

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Rising tides of insurmountable waves
Indiscriminate to zipcode and identification to a degree
Uncertainty and displacement
Helping hands extended in harm’s way
Humanity at a time when circumstance and situation require her best
Young and old
Equally dependent and deserving of a calming presence of safety and shelter
Flooded homes and dampened realities will yield to the power of hope and possibility
Created when one cares about others more than themselves
We must see the beauty in a difficult situation once again
Fleeting memories are etched with the trauma born from Harvey’s tears
Yet a city named Houston has been left to do the crying…

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Bipolar Nation

18 Sunday Jun 2017

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Civil unrest
Civil disobedience
Calls for subordination
Calls for enforcement of divisive ideologies of othering
Lives in turmoil as fear blankets them
ICE agents knocking on doors
Rounding up breathing, living, loving beings as if they were cattle being led to slaughter
Mothers and fathers separated from their children
Families in disarray as if they were being auctioned off for Southern plantations
For a simplified prescription for a complex circumstance
The hypocrisy of the time is one of major concern
Those who celebrate their ancestors’ arrival on such places as Ellis Island
Seem to not recognize that they too were from legacies of foreigners
Yet the romanticism ends quicker than it really began as this has been forgotten
We want them invisible to our lives unless they are speaking “our language”
Obeying our laws which we ourselves often abuse or ignore
Cooking our food
Washing our clothes
Making our beds when we travel
Manicuring our lawns
An underlying principle of the “American Way”
Exploitation of laborers in the form of free or significantly reduced labor
Voiceless
Faceless
Humanless
A nation is again putting those who are different on notice
Pray like us
Believe in our God
Believe in our Way
Concede your history and beliefs for a better way
A way made in “America”
Bipolar Nation
Should be our new anthem
For we have continually practiced a policy of forcing either or outcomes
Whether it was 1776
Or during the antebellum period
During the times of McCarthy and his hunt for Communists
We remain steadfast in being the obstacle in our own way
Bipolar nation
Either you have or you do not
That includes education, financial freedom, and health care
Yet we continue to look the other way until our hatred of others spills on our doorsteps
Our rhetoric of violence to not only those beyond our boundaries but those who reside within is disheartening
If you speak too sharply you may find yourself in the reach of the tentacles of the “Patriot Act”
More so like yelling “fire” in a crowded movie theatre
You are labeling yourself as if you wore a scarlet letter or Star of David
Bipolar nation
We are who we’ve always been yet most do not want to see
A nation whose fractured past prevents us from un-fracturing our present and future…

In Hopes of Tomorrow

04 Sunday Jun 2017

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Testimonials provide snapshots into the hearts and minds of the deliverer
Yet listeners translate those messages through tempered receptors
Constructing organic truths
Privileging their distinct sensibilities
Progressivism, liberalism, moderatism, or conservativism
Frame the lenses
socially accepted or recognized
Furthering the national pastime of divisiveness
Found morally
Religiously
Intellectually
Sexually
Economically
Racially
Throughout the landscape
Forefathers are perpetually propagated without further interrogation of their imperfections as founders of a more perfect union
A union of enslavement
Classism
Patriarchy
Reservational warfare
A more perfect union that applauds systematic hate and oppression
The birth of a nation of, for, and by the people
is idealistically my hope and wish for the future inhabitants
Yet, a harsh reality exists of
Wall building
Segregation
Exclusion
Gerrymandering
Victim-blaming
Selfishness
1% has become synonymous with what it has always been
A form of tyranny that ironically is fit for a king
Yet, this is a nation without monarchies
Without caste systems
Without true democracy
Incompleteness is an unfortunate present reality where
Love is not equally recognized
Cultures are not equally recognized
Languages are not equally recognized
Opportunities are not fully possible
In hopes of tomorrow
We must truly address the dispair of today…

Thoughts in Motion

18 Saturday Feb 2017

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Remarkably captured in my imagination
Perplexing yet understood
Of the variables that constitute this phenomenon
One that has fixed its sights and hold onto what was beyond reach
Stored away
Under guard
With each passing moment that begins to change
For the better
For the unknown
With each passing moment what is hardened becomes malleable
What is exiled becomes repatriated
The immeasurable chaos that accompanies becomes desired harmony
The instrumentation that orchestrates our understanding of ourselves
Takes center stage for this performance
Of life
A life that is less perfect than it has ever been before or envisioned
Garnered with civility and promise
Rooted in a core belief in something more
With each passing moment time becomes an echo
Reminding all within its reach of how important all things dear to us remain
Reminding us of the invaluable purpose of love
And its affect on all those who are fortunate enough to encounter its path…

Assail

18 Saturday Feb 2017

Posted by in Poetry, Uncategorized

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A festive congregation of diverse forms
Gathered in joy and celebration
Unknowingly targeted for reasons
Subjectively debated and/or ignored
The setting places those who truly
Seek to be advocates and allies
In perilous conundrums
Scared hearts and bodies
Others cold and riddled
Propaganda is the last thing needed
Or wanted to be heard
By a family, lover, and/or friend of anyone
Who was assailed
Violated
Traumatized
Or even scapegoated
Identities fractured by incomplete
Or politicized objectives
The absolute truth may never truly be known
Yet we can concretely deduce
There are no true winners if all of us
Truly embrace our humanity
Advocacy means we share our voices with those
Who oppression continues to work to mute
Advocacy means not playing the victim-blaming game
That often becomes the means of historical erasure
With each last breath or aching wound
Whether physical or emotional
We have all lost and are under assail
Race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, and culture among other aspects of our humanity
Have been further eroded
Orlando is just one of many examples of the
Detrimental effects of hate no matter the rationale
Love is not the solution when it is cloaked in complacency and inaction that shuns levels of sacrifice
Until each breath inhales this unalterable truth
There is no true we, yet the current national, societal, and political stances
Empower an assailant that has historically mutated
Each second, minute, hour, day, year, decade, and century
Known as the “American” F
Fear…

Timorous Island

29 Sunday Jan 2017

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Fixed in an outdated past
Where sheeted figures assailed the night
Burning lumber at the entries of those deemed inferior
A time fallacy was accepted truth to preserve a stunted status quo
One that could find a charred figure extended from a tree
We are supposedly beyond those moments within our history
Yet, as much as most continue to deny, as a nation, we have not healed
A legacy of contempt and hatred for those who are systematically “othered”
Made to disavow their identity and personhood to stay or enter
By the embodiment of a misguided arrogance
of a figurehead whose political stances should upset most’s sensibilities.
We are hoarders of a figmented freedom and truth as espoused.
We are fragmented factions of individuals who are forever works-in-progress towards ideals that were more exclusionary than collectivizing.
Internment camps, reservations, plantations, and forced institutionalization mark a history that is often absconded by revisionists.
As the rights of women continue to be decided by those who seek to objectify and posses them while not listening
oil continues to be placed at a premium in respect to the lives and traditions of Native Peoples.
Black lives are forever contemplated whether or not they matter.
Theoretical boarders are being replaced by executive orders and cowardly Congressional puppets.
Reclamation of antebellum doctrines and ideologies reignite divisions reminiscent of the North vs. South.
Those who love the same sex are denied all or many aspects of their civility because of debatable rules and rationales.
Allies are being made into enemies.
Neighbors are disrespected while simultaneously depended upon for their labor.
The continued poaching of a fragile morality is what remains.
Silence and pre-war isolationism didn’t work then and won’t work now.
While an audacity of hope was an idealistic battlecry
we are left with an undeniable truth on this metaphorical timorous island…

From Beyond the Prism

16 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by in Identity Politics, Poetry, Racialization Impacts, Uncategorized

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Captivating in ways that are detrimental
Far fetched and historically incomplete
Figments of others’ imaginations
Yet fundamentally an ascribed reality
Fear has reintroduced itself as fictive kin
Predating hands being raised
Votes being denied
Necks being roped
Bodies being burned
Left to be
To rot
To never become because many viewed us as never complete in the first place
Or maybe the 3/5 place
As compromise often happens to us but not for us
From beyond the prism
We are in a land that still finds ways to question our humanity
Personhood
Sense of self-actualization
Young boys and grown men recognize that Predator’s sights are historically locked on them
Young girls and grown women are both recipients and protectors of generations of young people who are precious gems even when a society seeks to denigrate them
As history tells us…
when not found in the history books of revisionist dehumanizers
whose fear of those who have been “othered” continues to permeate
The pores of a nation as many revisit its birth within theaters
The sweat off one’s brow from determination and a false belief of Meritocracy
Leaves much to be desired for those who were constitutional add-ons of the 13th, 14th, and/or 15th varieties
If we’re honest about Abe then would we really see the
Emancipation of physical bonds only to preserve psychological and economic ones can not be erased nor flipped as done by the party he’s so adamantly revered by
No donkey nor elephant seems to reach deep enough
Effectively address
Morally renounce
The effects resulting
From beyond the prism

Sirens Blazing

24 Sunday May 2015

Posted by in Poetry, Racialization Impacts

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Sirens blazing
Shots fired
Lives lost
Tears flowing

Sirens blazing
Shots fired
Lives lost
Tears flowing

A vicious cycle plaguing a nation full of rage
Rage that was neither emancipated in the age of Lincoln
Nor transcended with the election of Obama
In the spirit of bell hooks,
Black Looks and Killing Rage
Are still points of contingency for The Souls of Black Folk

Where are our Ida B. Wells or Sojourner Truths as the noose is replaced by the shield?
As the white sheets that supposedly aided The Birth of a Nation appear to be replaced by the “women and men in blue”
Is this a visceral reaction to a troubling time in this nation’s history?
For some, the answer will ultimately be “yes” but for others it will be more of the status quo.

A status quo response to the historic oppression and denigration of a collection of people who seem to have never received the promise of humanity
A collection of people whose bodies are riddled with emotional, physical, psychological, and visual assaults

Perceptions that continue for Africana women in the manner in which their bodies are assailed in a land of Patriarchy
Perceptions that continue as men of African descent no matter how well groomed or dressed still receive the “clench your purse” and/or “lock your door” treatment

Sirens blazing
Shots fired
Lives lost
Tears flowing

Sirens blazing
Shots fired
Lives lost
Tears flowing

Bloody streets along dilapidated buildings
Underfunded communities make for easy targets
Not solely for the spectacle of media coverage but for the many corporate and venture capitalists who will undoubtedly swoop in for bargain prices to fulfill their duties of gentrification

Bye-bye Fourth Ward AKA Freedmen’s Town in Houston, TX
Bye-bye to as many indicators of the past that cannot be revised by our Educational Agencies and elected/appointed officials who wish to promote a particular narrative

Sirens blazing
Shots fired
Lives lost
Tears flowing

Sirens blazing
Shots fired
Lives lost
Tears flowing

Are chickens coming home to roost?
El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz once raised such a point
And we are still waiting for an explicit answer

Sirens
Shots
Lives
Tears…