I am not done yet
I have not passed on

My back may hurt
it still moves

The sloth in my movement may be caused by pain
Id rather feel pain than not feel

My heart may be tough and leathery
it is not cold
it is not stone

My laughs are deeper
longer

My love is harder
stronger

When I do speak
it is often low

there is no need to shout
there is no need to comment on everything
every thing is not my concern

What I have
now
is knowledge

What I know
now
is how to filter information


© Christopher F. Brown 2018

When I first met you
you could barely stand
yourself

your words
not mine

It wouldn’t have been fair
asking you to stand with me

Unfair to me
not you


I see you question yourself now


“Can they see?”
“Do they know?”

You know you only hide
masks
shells
I laugh because you’ve even tried fur

Some see
Some know

And you pray
To see them before they see you

And you pray
To know them before they know you

I’ll say a French sigh instead of writing it
Anyway

You play a game called self
Id like to ask you some questions
but you already knew that didn’t you


© Christopher F. Brown 2017

“You wanna go to the crystal shop with me?
  Maybe some coffee?”

First things we said

Buying matching bullhorns
for later


I’ll show you how to wrap sage
leaves
You can show me how to build
a fire

Lucky
Blessed
Charmed
Happy

We didn’t have to wait
long


We’ll make a pact


We’ll promise to grow old
Side by side
We know we’re already
Dead

This was the first time
We understood


Oui



© Christopher F. Brown 2017

Rap was my first love
Rap will always hold my fire

Hip Hop will always have my heart
Hip Hop will always be the one I come home too

We started together
Even when she is on some *******
Mumbling around town with technicolor hair
Crunch berry grills
looking like a cartoon villain
I get it

Rock was cool
sometimes we all need to scream
need to be sad and different
sometimes we don’t need words
just a guitar
just a bass
just a drum

It’s a funny thing to say:

The Blues made me laugh
laugh hard too
That’s why she said she left me
she said she was done.

I got so lost in Jazz
When I thought I left I realized
I’m still here

When I thought I had seen all that there is to see
When I thought I rounded the final corner
It turned out to be a street named Lombard  
The light shone on me in notes of blue
With the blessing of The Sun and Ra

I realized
off beat is the beat

Jazz
She’s like Hip Hop
I may go away
but I’ll never leave.


© Christopher F. Brown 2018

I don't know if it was me
maybe it was them
It could be me
You should never rule that possibility out

my peers and I

we really didn't relate until our late thirties
maybe forties

Even now
as they did then
they say I'm a crazy fool

What is crazy
the same things they said I was crazy for
10, 20 years ago
I see them walking hand in hand with now

Claiming the crazy thing as their own new born precious truth
birthed from their own life trials and tribulations
spawned from their own hard fought and barely survived experiences

What I was foolish for
Is valuable and teachable wisdom now

Maybe I was always old
Maybe the world just went crazy long ago
and I was just crazy enough to see it
ride the wave as it were

I think when we're all in our sixties
they'll get what I'm talking about now
I hope I'm not dead by then


© Christopher F. Brown 2017

Delusional
By years
By fears

We now say
Concerned

We fear not
We worry not

Why then are we
Concerned

Are we Delusional

Should we now say
Misunderstood
Misguided

Intentionally avoiding reality
Labeling it something: other
Labeling it something: manageable

Something

As it is not
Even though that
Is


© Christopher F. Brown 2018