Fraud happiness, can no longer pretend
Alone in this world, no real friends
Living within a dream, can’t wake up
Giving in to life, no way for a shape up
Losing balance with thyself, no living purpose
Demolished by close ones, everlasting feeling worthless
See into your soul, how can one be this empty
Trying to move on but death is tempting
Rivers cried, pain overbearing
Existence died, life over whelming
Eyes open outside, soul’s dead asleep within
Unable to understand, most impossible to convince
Nothing without you, the lifeline for my heart beat
Lost for so long, awaiting the perfect eye to see

As the transient day slips by,
We work for our food and shelter.
We busy ourselves with toil
In a sultry, oppresive swelter.
This is the way of things, of course,
As we seek to survive the world’s hardships.
But we must not lose hope, so we keep words
Of encouragement on our lips.

But the day wanders late,
And we must prepare for
The perilous darkness…

Looking up, we saw the day’s diadem
Dropping and dwindling
Into an expanding distance.
A widening waste spreads,
Swallowing our hope and
Threatening our existence.
We kneeled to pray for protection
During this cold gloom of catharsis.
It seemed a ghostly mist approached,
As if from ancient Tarsus.

Suddenly, the warming orb shatters
Against the horizon,
Exploding with resplendent rubies,
Flying out from the surface!
Before this crystalline spectacle we are transfixed,
As our hearts discover a renewed purpose.

This shimmering treasure
Was then drawn up,
As the night’s shade descended,
To stand as a symbol
Of an eternal hope,
Just as God Intended.
To fill the sky with wonderful lights,
Creating a crown Of destiny.
We beheld its glory,
Within and without,
As our fears were transformed
Into ecstasy!

In that moment, we cried out,
“Come, O' Night! We reflect your beauty!
In this darkened aura,
We feel the embrace of an Arcadian love!
Night! Portent of our death and
Harbinger of our illumination,
We are kin with the stars!
We are citizens of the heavens above!”

penning a poem in his Oakland
flat, he was stuck at double nines
each of the lines was fueled
by a Winston, each stanza, cheap
red wine, and quiet desperation

outside, the beat of bongos, the pop
of zip guns and the wail of sirens; if
the summer of love was hot at Haight,
nobody told the Panthers who crashed
in the pad below his

he wanted to tell the world this,
epic style, an odyssey on asphalt
a choreography of elbows breaking glass,
and boys running fast, in 'hoods where
every mother's son died too young

but he couldn't weave the right words
to end a story that started with **** filled
hulls of ships, the crack of whips, a war
of bro against bro, and Jim Crow to keep
the nightmare alive in the light of day

now the "Man" snatched them up
with draft notices, turned boys into men
and men into monkeys to be mowed down
in jungles in a question mark on
a map most had never seen

stanza 99, where were the words?
another Winston, another swig of sweet
red wine, though nothing came, until he
heard it--a baby crying in the night
and he picked up his Bic and wrote:

Here you are, coal black child of a distant star
calling out in a language as old as time, "I am hungry!
Hungry for more! Fill my belly with mama's milk,
my lungs with god's free air, and let me grow strong,
straight and brave--brave enough to dream through
all this dreaded darkness."

Oakland, August, 1967

My ship has been beaten and battered, the hull has had enough. I am tired and weary, the seas have finally found their calm. Long has the voyage been but now I need to rest. Through many storms I have sailed longing for safe harbor. Now on the horizon I see the lights of a new city and my final port of call. So with what little strength I can muster and with the last drop of faith that is in me. I unfurl my sails as I feel a soft gentle breeze blowing at my back. Onward I go as the hull cuts through the calm water, I see the lights getting ever brighter as a new dawn seems to be breaking from an unknown place. With quiet resolve I set my rudder amid ship and head forward, as I get ever closer to the bright new shores, I can see images of people I know, my eyes now grow heavy as if I am entering a dream. The troubled waters of life fade away as I finally make land fall to the lights that have been calling me home for so long.

A sound ringing in my ears
Alarms raging in my soul
Fire running through my veins
Night burning black as coal

The truth within I fear  
A change I can’t see clear
Many years have past
But the memories remain…

Her tears smeared on my hands
A fate this curse foretold
All my lies have revealed
The way my soul was sold

The white eyes of the sky
Peer down into my mind
Many years have past
But these memories remain…

A time to return, to heal these wounds
To find my free will, a new path to choose

The Earth shifts at the core
No fate is set in stone
A purpose guides my course
The future is mine alone

The change that seemed unclear
Now stands in my view
It’s time to **** my fear
To fly the miles back to you

A time to return, to heal your wounds
To find my free will, a new path to you.
The tides they will rise, by the light of the moon    
Travel over miles, to get closer to true.  

A time to return, to heal these wounds
To find my free will, a new path to you.

(A note:  in this poem, the authors write alternate stanzas.)

FREEDOM

has always demanded
my surrender to an instant in time
surrender to fate and therefore
to glory

Though my wily will
has oft gotten in the way
with grand illusions and the necessary
fiction that I am in command

But in the end, it is command
of nothing and no one
for that is the nature of time,
mean shrew who prunes our hopes

A clock that does not click
nor clang, but flies tirelessly; one day
its talons will ****** us away, releasing us
forever, from the burdens of the day

And until those burdens take flight
I carry a candle for the hours, open a book
for the days, and teach my trembling hand
to hold on to hope.