His face cracked
Every wrinkle a ravine
A broad smile of marble tombstones
Rolling his sapphire ivory eyes

I'm ninety three
He chuckled...  Ninety three
Yes,  it goes fast son I'll tell you how fast
I've only as many memories as you

The winds have died, but flowers go on falling;
birds call, but silence penetrates each song.

The Mystery! Unknowable, unlearnable.
The virtue of Kannon.

i don't watch home movies
hate them
reason being because
when i was young
i was looking for a movie
my mother
had recorded for me
and accidentally
put one in the vcr
that i'm not sure
i was supposed to see
i know the obvious response
"uh oh, ****"
sorry to disappoint
they were only marked with dates
  1991
on live television
montel williams asks my father
"how can you just throw
your child away like a piece of trash?"
   1994
i spend so much time
in the emergency room
that my parents stop
penciling in growth marks
on the frame
of my bedroom door
i always thought
it was because they believed
i would never grow out
of this sickness
sometimes i believe
the reason that they
never bought me a dream catcher
was because they never thought
i'd live long enough
to see them come true
   1996
i am eliminated
from a spelling bee
because i didn't know
the 'dad' is silent in 'family'
   2013
before i got into poetry
i used to do standup
none of my jokes were funny
one of the other comics
tells me my skits are dry
sometimes sad
he says "why don't you joke
about something like your family?"
so i say
"i never wore any sunblock
because i didn't want anything
to keep me from my father"
i say "what do you call christmas
without lights or heat?"
before he has a chance
to answer
i say "1997. better yet
why don't you
make like a dad and
leave"
   2014
every time we drive
past the hospital
my mother reminds me
how much it cost to save my life
like she'd rather
have her money back
she doesn't have to say
that sometimes she wishes
it was me who had died
instead of my brother
i can hear it in the way
she says "love you"
sometimes i imagine
that if i were to die
that she
would pick out a casket for a child
because she never loved
the person i became
yesterday i told my father
how close i'd been
to suicide lately
and he said
"that's my boy,
livin on the edge.."
and i can't remember
if i laughed
or cried

Feeling at this time, that I should really go to bed, but
Still I lay awake, and contemplate, what Fred Hampton said:
“If you dare to struggle, then you dare to win, if you dare
Not to Struggle, then you don't deserve to win.”
They shot him dead in his bed, tell me how long has it been?
10, 20, nearly 50 years, since the things that happened then,
What happened to the Panthers, Malcolm X and Dr. King, or
The Anarchists in Spain, the songs of victory they'd sing?
What happened to the world of struggle, in which they all used to live?
Where liberation's sweet embrace propelled the efforts they would give
You see, we need to put the ‘unity’ back into ‘community,’ and
That begins with you and me, living side by side, and
Working with each other, taking measures to deride, the
Ills of our condition that serve only to divide,
Those old notions of race, those old notions of gender, with
Raised fists, as we march, taking heed to engender,
A whole new way of life, and a vision to render,
Filled with class consciousness, making us a contender,
Maybe I could lie down, and I could find some rest now,
If we would only stop to realize that we're the real ‘how.’