The black names drip from our obituaries, sticky and thin.
You would think they would burn into our minds,
the brand of injustice against bound skin—
But a headstone is lost in unending lines.

It is horrifying.

Despicable.

How do we allow one man to **** another in cold blood?
Life spilled pours out in floods
Our men in blue drenched red
With the staggering numbers dead
And we sit back with “not all cops are the same”

Not every officer’s a killer but do you remember the names
Treyvon and Michael and Eric and Dontre and John and Ezell and Dante and Tanisha and Akai and poor little Tamir, who was still a kid,

Tell me what he did?

There is systematic opression and agression against a group skin defined
Where ****** is fine, it happens all the time, killers let off the line
Because of an oath that should bind
The oath they forget, the promise to protect, held up for all citizens except
The ones they choose to neglect

The badge not a shield but a riot ram
Against those that take a stand
And raise defiant hands
For the names lost in the clatter,

Black Lives Matter.