the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right

in the supposedly post-racial united states of america

the only thing this society seems to be is post humanity.

black americans are routinely treated with barely a shred of human decency.

stripped of our agency under the iron fist of white supremacy

post the cold blooded murders of Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin, Ezell Ford, Eric Garner, Kimane Gray, John Crawford, and countless others-

these are the strange fruits that hang from our nation’s poplar trees.

the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right. or is it nineteen sixty four? many a time I have opened the morning paper to see headlines that would not be out of place in that era of bloodshed.

more care given to a cotton cloth flag than to the black bodies that lie battered and broken in the streets.

"think of the businesses!" they scream, mouths afroth.

but won't anyone think of the black children murdered for carrying BB Guns? won't anyone think of the fathers? the mothers? the sons and daughters whose lives are cut short by those who are supposed to 'protect and serve?'

I will stop "making this about race" when the police stop giving me reason to fear for my life simply for existing. it is not enough to be peaceful and innocent anymore.

does this conversation upset you? can you not cope with these atrocities that go on every day in your precious land of the free?

In a sick way it almost makes sense

that in a nation built from nothing upon the backs of the enslaved

that it would take a bit longer than a hundred and fifty years to stop feeling the pain.

the whips and chains that once bound us were not broken, but merely transformed.

our shackles are now student loans;

plantations were exchanged for privatized prisons and lynch mobs now wear blue uniforms.

the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right.

maybe it’s got something to do with the way that all people seem to care about nowadays is iggy azalea’s new hit single but not the way that white rappers want to be black so badly up until it’s time to fight for us. to march with us. to die with us.

miley cyrus can prance around onstage fetishizing black bodies like modern day hottentot venuses but when black bodies are being violated by the police she’s strangely silent.

the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right.


but there is a light that shines through this darkness. that light is within me, and you, and within the hearts of every single man and woman of all colors and creeds who raises their fists and says "No more."  

our fight is not over. the road will be long. it is very possible that more will die along the way.  but their deaths will not be in vain.

the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right. but it will not be this way forever.

and and fourteen and something isn't right

in the supposedly post-racial united states of america

the only thing this society seems to be is post humanity.

black americans are routinely treated with barely a shred of human decency.

stripped of our agency under the iron fist of white supremacy

post the cold blooded murders of Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin, Ezell Ford, Eric Garner, Kimane Gray, John Crawford, and countless others-

these are the strange fruits that hang from our nation’s poplar trees.

the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right. or is it nineteen sixty four? many a time I have opened the morning paper to see headlines that would not be out of place in that era of bloodshed.

more care given to a cotton cloth flag than to the black bodies that lie battered and broken in the streets.

"think of the businesses!" they scream, mouths afroth.

but won't anyone think of the black children murdered for carrying BB Guns? won't anyone think of the fathers? the mothers? the sons and daughters whose lives are cut short by those who are supposed to 'protect and serve?'

I will stop "making this about race" when the police stop giving me reason to fear for my life simply for existing. it is not enough to be peaceful and innocent anymore.

does this conversation upset you? can you not cope with these atrocities that go on every day in your precious land of the free?

In a sick way it almost makes sense

that in a nation built from nothing upon the backs of the enslaved

that it would take a bit longer than a hundred and fifty years to stop feeling the pain.

the whips and chains that once bound us were not broken, but merely transformed.

our shackles are now student loans;

plantations were exchanged for privatized prisons and lynch mobs now wear blue uniforms.

the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right.

maybe it’s got something to do with the way that all people seem to care about nowadays is iggy azalea’s new hit single but not the way that white rappers want to be black so badly up until it’s time to fight for us. to march with us. to die with us.

miley cyrus can prance around onstage fetishizing black bodies like modern day hottentot venuses but when black bodies are being violated by the police she’s strangely silent.

the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right.


but there is a light that shines through this darkness. that light is within me, and you, and within the hearts of every single man and woman of all colors and creeds who raises their fists and says "No more."  

our fight is not over. the road will be long. it is very possible that more will die along the way.  but their deaths will not be in vain.

the year is two thousand and fourteen and something isn't right. but it will not be this way forever.

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.

dabnagit  Travel back to before the nation began
and see Crispus Attucks killed — the
first American to die for American freedom, a freedom denied to his African and Native American forebears. Take a knee to honor his sacrifice and the other four dead.

Take a knee in grief that he who would become president minimized these first martyrs as "a motley rabble of saucy boys, negros and molattoes, Irish teagues and outlandish Jack Tarrs.”

Stand at Morris Island, South Carolina, where American soldiers fought to keep a young nation whole, a field of blue with 35 stars, not 22. Take a knee for the 54th Massachusetts Voluntary Infantry and its score killed at Fort Wagner, a hundred more presumed dead.

Take a knee in grief that the U.S. Army rescinded its promise of equality and paid the 54th little more than half a white soldier's monthly pay. Take a knee in awe at those who refused any pay that was less, yet died with "Massachusetts and Seven Dollars a Month!" on their lips, defending their white comrsdes' retreat.

Take a knee for Sgt. Medgar Evers, who defeated fascists at Normandy only to be killed by them once he was back home.

Take a knee from the suckerpunch by a U.S. senator from Mississippi in 1917, who said the return of black veterans would “inevitably lead to disaster.” Once you “impress the ***** with the fact that he is defending the flag” and “inflate his untutored soul with military airs,” it would be easy for him to conclude “his political rights must be respected.” Take a knee to honor those who died defending freedom. Take a knee to weep for the sharp rise in lynchings after both world wars — following the return of those impressed, untutored ***** souls inflated with military airs for having served.

Look at the lists, look at the videos, look at the witness testimony, look at the double standard: Amadou Diallo. Manuel Loggins Jr. Ronald Madison. Kendra James. Sean Bell. Eric Garner. Michael Brown. Alton Sterling. Philando Castile. (Take a knee; this could take awhile.) Akiel Denkins. Gregory Gunn. Samuel DuBose. Brendon Glenn. Freddie Gray. Natasha McKenna. Walter Scott. Christian Taylor. Ezell Ford. Akai Gurley. Laquan McDonald. (Take a breath.) Tamir Rice. Yvette Smith. Jamar Clark. Rekia Boyd. Shereese Francis. Ramarley Graham. LaTanya Haggerty. Margaret LaVerne Mitchell. And on and on. And on.

Take a knee for the unarmed, or subdued, or even fleeing men and women killed by officers pledged to protect and serve. Take a knee too for the officers killed by gun-toting gangsters…or by homeowners fearing a home invasion. While you're at it, take a knee for the more than 50 people killed every year by toddlers exercising their Second Amendment rights.

And take a knee for the soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines who died so that a football player can take a knee as long as some people are shot by police in the back, or even when down, or even after they're on their knees…while others for some reason are far less likely to be shot in the same circumstances. Take a knee, Rodin-like, and ponder why.

Take a knee and join those who are taking a knee out of respect not only for the flag, but for the republic for which it stands, one nation…

(Striving to be a more perfect union)

…under God…

(Who "created all men equal"; "male and female he created them.")

…indivisible…

("Build that wall!" "Lock her up!" "Fire the sons of ******* if they won't stand for this flag but run them over if they protest a rebel flag!")

…with liberty and justice for all lives can't matter unless black lives matter.

So for these all, and many more, take a knee. Take your time, but take some heart. Then lift each other up and lock your arms. Play ball.

Let’s pay homage to many innocent black lives that were taken by
the corrupt system:  Martin Luther King Jr.  Malcom X.  Emmett Till.  George Stinney.  Will Brown.  Sandra Bland.  Trayvon Martin.  Ahmaud Arbery.  Breonna Taylor. George Floyd.  David McAtee.  Natosha “Tony” McDade.  Yassin Mohamed.  Finan H. Berhe.  Sean Reed.  Steven Demarco Taylor.  Ariane McCree.  Terrance Franklin.  Miles Hall.  Darius Tarver.  William Green.  Samuel David Mallard.  Kwame “KK” Jones.  De’von Bailey.  Christopher Whitfield.  Anthony Hill.  Eric Logan.  Jamarion Robinson.  Gregory Hill Jr.  JaQuavion Slaton.  Ryan Twyman.  Brandon Webber.  Jimmy Atchison.  Willie McCoy.  Emantic “Ej” Fitzgerald Bradford Jr.  D’ettrick Griffin.  Jemel Roberson.  DeAndre Ballard.  Botham Shem Jean.  Robert Lawrence White.  Anthony Lamar Smith.  Ramarley Graham.  Manuel Loggins Jr.  Wendell Allen.  Kendrec McDade.  Larry Jackson Jr.  Jonathan Ferrell.  Jordan Baker.  Victor White III.  Dontre Hamilton.  Eric Garner.  John Crawford III.  Michael Brown.  Ezell Ford.  Dante Parker.  Kajieme Powell.  Laquan McDonald.  Akai Gurley.  Tamir Rice.  Rumain Brisbon.  Tony Robinson.  Mario Woods.  Quintonio LeGrier.  Gregory Gunn.  Akiel Denkins.  Alton Sterling.  Philando Castile.  Terrance Sterling.  Terrence Crutcher.  Keith Lamont Scott.  Alfred Olango.  Jordan Edwards.  Stephon Clark.  Danny Ray Thomas.  Dejuan Guillory.  Patrick Harmon.  Jonathan Hart.  Maurice Granton.  Julius Johnson.  Jamee Johnson.  Michael Dean.  Keith Childress.  Bettie Jones.  Kevin Matthews.  Michael Noel.  Leroy Browning.  Leroy Nelson.  Miguel Espinal.  Nathaniel Pickett.  Tiara Thomas.  Cornelius Brown.  Jamal Clark.  Richard Perkins.  Michael Lee Marshall.  Alonzo Smith.  Anthony Ashford.  Dominic Hutchinson.  Lamontez Jones.  Rayshaun Cole.  Paterson Brown.  Christopher Kimble.  Junior Prosper.  Keith McLeod.  Wayne Wheeler.  Lavante Biggs.  India Kager.  Tyree Crawford.  James Carney.  Felix Kumi.  Asshams Manley.  Christian Taylor.  Troy Robinson.  Brian Day.  Michael Sabbie.  Billy Ray Davis.  Samuel Dubose.  Darrius Stewart.  Albert Davis.  Salvado Ellswood.  George Mann.  Jonathan Sanders.  Freddie Blue.  Victo Larosa.  Spencer McCain.  Kevin Bajoie.  Zamiel Crawford.  Jermaine Benjamin.  Kris Jackson.  Kevin Higgenbotham.  Ross Anthony.  Richard Gregory Davis.  Curtis Jordan.  Markus Clark.  Lorenzo Hayes.  De’Angelo Stallsworth.  Dajuan Graham.  Brandon Glenn.  Reginald Moore.  Nuwnah Laroche.  Jason Champion.  Bryan Overstreet.  David Felix.  Terry Lee Chatman.  William Chapman.  Samuel Harrell.  Freddie Gray.  Norman Cooper.  Brian Acton.  Darrell Brown.  Frank Shephard III.  Walter Scott.  Donald “Dontay” Ivy.  Eric Harris.  Phillip White.  Dominick Wise.  Jason Moland.  Bobby Gross.  Denzel Brown.  Brandon Jones.  Askari Roberts.  Terrance Moxley.  Anthony Hill.  Bernard Moore.  Naeschylus Vinzant.  Tony Robinson.  Charly Leundeu “Africa” Keunang.  Darrell Gatewood.  Deontre Dorsey.  Thomas Allen Jr.  Lavall Hall.  Calvon Reid.  Gerdie Moise.  Terry Price.  Natasha McKenna.  Jeremy Lett.  Kevin Garrett.  Alvin Haynes.  Artago Damon Howard.  Tiano Meton.  Andre Larone Murphy Sr.  Leslie Sapp.  Brian Pickett.  Frank Smart.  Matthew Ajibade.

There are so many more that have died at the hands of the prejudice system.  All of you will never be forgotten.  Your legacy will forever live on.  Rest in Paradise to the fallen angels.