I am from garbage trucks invading the streets,
bringing young ones to the window.
I am from the hum of the washer
bleeding into layered daydreams.
I am from charcoal painted on eyelids.
I am from opinions stronger than the smell of coffee.
I am from bones deep in closets,
buried by golden memories.
I am from the honey sweet songs
mama whispers.
I am from the deadly faces of strangers
and the suffocation of opinions
spewed as facts.
I am from the smoothest jazz
to the heaviest rock.
I am from
books with plastic casings
stacked high in the grass
on a sunny day.
I am from
every word or statement I have ever heard
to ever word or statement I will ever say.
I am from
late night fires
with sweet tea, the song of the night, and the light of the stars.
I am from
the soft smell
of a baby's head
to the feeling of thick smoke
filling tired lungs.
I am from the denial of death
to the hesitation of life.
I am from
smooth rocks under bare feet
to cold, harsh rain stinging sun-dried skin.
I am from strength
and weakness.
I am from me to you.
That
is where I am from.

No where to go. Lost in this
Open field, of life, and it's just me.    Here.                    Alone.
Been searching for that place to call home.
Only, what is  home?
Don't give up!
You can do it. Just believe in yourself! You got the
Strength to go on.

Home is where the heart is--that's home.
Open and free, loving and caring. No
Matter where the road takes you; Remember
E**veryone will struggle in life and we will all get through it.

This cold and untouched heart,
has for many years laid apart,
now it is blunt and stark
no longer a weapon of my soul.

But recently I've gained
an electric feel
cause whenever I think of you
my spine start to reel.
It tingles up my back
and leave a mark
right in the center.
Right in the heart.

They say a human,
can only use 10%
of his entire mind,
well these days I am reduced
to a mere 2%.
I stand in class,
unable to answer
I stare at my page
clueless on what to write
and I play sports
without the fire of passion inside me,
because its only 2% of my mind.
One day a man asked me,
what has happened and do you regret it?
I stood and said
"no sir, no I do not"
Because that 8%  I gave to you,
to make me focus
on every little thing you do.

They killed a Man,

They killed a Message,

They Killed a Vision,

They killed a Dream,

They killed universal Peace,

But...

No matter what they do,

The Dream still lives on,

The Dream still marches on,

The Dream still shines on,

The Dream still glows brightly on.



©Rangzeb Hussain

I met the Bishop on the road
And much said he and I.
'Those ******* are flat and fallen now,
Those veins must soon be dry;
Live in a heavenly mansion,
Not in some foul sty.'

'Fair and foul are near of kin,
And fair needs foul,' I cried.
'My friends are gone, but that's a truth
Nor grave nor bed denied,
Learned in ****** lowliness
And in the heart's pride.

'A woman can be proud and stiff
When on love intent;
But Love has pitched his mansion in
The place of excrement;
For nothing can be sole or whole
That has not been rent.'

My wife, a psychiatrist, sleeps
through my reading and writing in bed,
the half-whispered lines,
manuscripts piled between us,

but in the deep part of night
when her beeper sounds
she bolts awake to return the page
of a patient afraid he'll **** himself.

She sits in her robe in the kitchen,
listening to the anguished voice
on the phone. She becomes
the vessel that contains his fear,

someone he can trust to tell
things I would tell to a poem.