A resonant gratitude streams through my veins,
Consecrated to my middle school heroines, deflecting
The whispers of shame.
But they taught me that I do not have the luxury of shame;
I have a voice, and I must amplify it––that’s what my mother said.

Elles m’ont protégée, blossoming my oneness.
I am here now because of them, I harness their divine feminine
Strength.

Standing on the bones of my aunties, their anguish travels up,
Their histories following suit.
Beneath my feet, to my knuckles; charging my inner being
My spine is rigid, fortified with the duty––
To liberate, to reform, and to love.
“But my love,” she tells me earnestly, “this love, has been assumed,
Taken for granted, blended into the background of the White man’s portrait.”

My dun skin lives in the ambiguity of praise and prejudice,
And my sisters are dead. Exploited, first––then dead.
As were my mother’s grandmothers, when the Britons drew the line.
The assembly line, however, was an American invention––
Where the American Dream came to fruition. Commodified neatly,
‘Cheaply’ produced, and easy to swallow: fine [Black*] American craftmanship!

Her tomb
Stone, will be mined by her brothers.
He is unearthing the buried history, but forced to push coal into the fire,
Cremating the legacies of his own kin.

“So what are you going to say at my funeral now that you’ve killed me?”
Her lasts words, found amongst the ashes.

There is this pair of sweatpants,
they sit in the bottom left drawer of my dresser.
Sometimes
I like to picture myself wearing them.

That comfortable,
snuggly feeling.
Like a warm hug
from an old friend
you used to crush on.

It's such an out there concept,
- but imagine if it happened.
Me
wearing those sweatpants
from the bottom left drawer of my dresser.
Or that black hoodie
that my mom got me two Christmases ago
the one that she special purchased because so it'd fit just right
Or any stained shirt ever
one that you can wear for comfort at home
because finally no one is watching.

I learned young
to button-up
so that there wouldn't be
as many eyes watching me today
so i can go and buy my favourite candy
from that gas station down the street.

And I always wondered
why some people's sunday best
was my only way to feel normal.

I was about 10
when I learned
that wearing comfortable
might get me stopped
by the police today.

I guess this is what it's like
to be true
north
strong
and free.

All you wicked men
what is wrong with you?

There is no black Justice
seen on the Sistine Chapel.

Only the stupidities that
can make a stuff bird laugh-

the small axe ready
to cut the big tree down.

https://youtu.be/b0Tk-FoiX_0

Based loosely on theSteve McQueen anthology  of films.  The first in the series is titled Mangrove.  The title is from a Bob Marley song.

Pursuit of justice and Gold

Giving it all away
Saying words with purpose
A search for justice
A black man standing on the bus
Righteous indignity
Look at me
Is this what it means to be free
Is this pursuit of happy
Or is this life just ******
Look at me
And what do you see
Do you see a color or do you see a name?
Or just someone to blame
Do you see a man with hope
Or do you see a man struggling to cope
Do you offer a hand or hang a rope
Can you love someone like me
Or can that never be
Look as far as the eye can see
People living in misery
Why is change so slow
Where did decency go
Swim against the flow
Sometimes it’s hard to let go
Which way the wind will blow
On this journey I will go
It’s keep playing or fold
It’s everyone wanting some gold
It’s about ******* so old
It’s about the power you hold
Old white and grey hair
Controlling markets everywhere
You don’t want to share
You don’t care
This is not fair
I’m a man, same as you
I have hopes and dreams too
I’m the same as you

What is Justice

What is justice
Does it have a color,
does it have a temperature
The blacker the shooter the louder the news
The tighter the noose
Equality seems to download slower
for those it doesn’t favor
Section 8 flats raise ghetto minded soldiers
Trained to live in prison cells
While leaving empty sits in classrooms
Mothers raising fathers
because their fathers left them,
now live in prisons,
physically, emotionally & mentally
That means when they have their kids they will probably leave them

What Is Justice
Generational curses bless the defenseless
Praising violence because slave masters
Programmed them to hate knowledge
Think less and work more labour after labour
While slave masters stole roots away from their family trees,
then told them to go figure out their identities,
Black Kings and Queens demoralized and carried in shackles, to rebel they now wear more ice than a cold fridge,
painted in movies as villains but have more knowledge than those that run universities, but stuck behind the walls of justice fighting all kinds of adversities,
like starting a race with no legs to run with,
stuck in one place, asking themselves what is justice


What is Justice
Is justice a word we chase in a world imprisoned by the thought of equality?
it doesn’t work if it doesn’t end in a tragedy, wearing hoodies, selling cigarettes, simply driving, could determine the end of you, living everyday under pressure like living through an interview, or facing the end of a loaded barrow,
Yelling please don’t shoot, while the one holding the gun comes to take your tomorrow, these black tears have cried till they have ran dry, social justice tried and still couldn’t change justice
now we challenge the notion of which life matters more, black or blue
This world got no clue
acting like history never took place, in a race of race, forgetting those who sacrificed for us to win the global race
how much more should the dark skinned give to get an ounce of freedom

What is justice
Is justice a word or a curse to the darker skinned, is justice determined based on one’s pigmentations, causing deeply rooted segregation, “all man are created equal” but we forgot about the sequel, in the end it tells us that we are not equal...


So... What is justice?

Another Tinder match
supposed we hike to bromo mountain
If not to suffer me

neighbor country guy
Where jaded is the least people be
lives in a bunkbed dorm room
For months and months
Certified to put judgement
on strangers

He studies everyone
But locals
Talks in languages
but local's

He's interested in story of stragers
But not my story
Too local maybe

One lunch in a local's
I lend him lunch money
He never thinks he owes me
A thing

He sits there on the corner
Reading people's story
Those whose land made
By foreign spices, coal, and sweats
Like me