thinking about how cops are beating protestors senseless not even 20 minutes from where i live.
thinking about how they block off the streets and stand unmasked, batons in hand, other hand resting pointedly on their gun.
thinking about how it could be me next— another unspecified black face and black body and black existence snuffed out— a hashtag, a mural.
          (and those are the lucky ones.)
thinking about how a memorial is the best case scenario for a black life.
thinking about the bodies in the street.
thinking about blood splattering the ground, mixing with paint and obscuring the “black lives matter” lettering on the road.
thinking about the chalk art and loud music in a neighborhood soon-to-be-gentrified.
thinking about how we’ve grown used to the stench of rotting flesh outside our doors.
thinking about the taste of blood in my mouth from my nearly-severed tongue i didn’t realize i was biting.
thinking about the tension in my neck and jaw.
thinking about the way my eyes never seem to close.
thinking about the eyes that will never again open.
thinking thinking thinking.