Ceiling

What lesson can be learned
What dream can be found
What pain can be stopped
What joy can be lived

Days gone playing in rewind
Staring at the white dusty fan
On the ceiling
Feeling blocked like the stars
Staring at the white dusty fan
On the ceiling

Not connected to the world
Traveling slower than time
While the black cloud of fear
Creeps up my neck’s back
Being absorbed by
Freshly lotioned skin

Indigo terror, everything darker
The sun is so cold, but the nights
Are colder, lonelier, more quiet
Leaves only me to hear myself
Future demons rising, yanking,
Tearing parts of me away, leaving
Me empty, emptier than usual

Silence, be still my heart
Listen to the bottle of aspirin
Dance with it, my last love

We lay on quilted sheets
Staring up at the white
Dusty fan as the world
Slowly turns to black

Questions linger as parental
Chess pieces move into the room
Wooden and marble tears
Etch the faces as they watch
Their knight lost in the game

(I just found this poem I wrote it in 2007)

Far from You

Like the bright red torrent
swirling around number 5
watching over our dim green world
I am far, distant away
from anything resembling
that emotional strangle
the pleasant asphyxiation
associated with the carnal desire
the sunshine in the rain
that so many people find it so easy
to be in, to live in
to breathe in, as i choke
and cough and spit up parts of my lung
trying to run, to escape
this knife that could kill the old me
and phoenix flame respawn me
into something more caring
more thoughtful, more selfless
more able to look in your eyes
and say four letters that
have sunk ships, destroyed countries
and made some of the most beautiful
art and music the world has ever seen
but again it avoids me, or i avoid it
like a flu during the summer
hoping that if i have enough hand sanitizer
that virus laden ring never
takes a hold of my hand

Black Enough

Since about the age of 5

When rice crispies covered in koolaid made smile

And  clouds made bunnies and jets in the sky

You told me that I wasn’t black enough

You told me that my grades in English class

And on sol tests were not good enough

You told me that being smart is trash

And that you should do like all the other boys

Did and want to, wish for, and hope to play a sport

You said that my pants weren’t dangling

Low like mandingos tip, sag lower , sag lower you said

Even though that breeze that snuck up the creak of my cheeks

Never did feel quite right to me

You said that this music is what makes you

You have to talk with a swang, and walk like you’re the thang

And make sure that your hardcore all the fucking time

And I tried, but you never quite believed me

Said that I was uppity and white

An oreo and not the good kind that is in a Dairy Queen blizzard

It hurt me, like a knife through my culture

Right through to my race that I kept in my heart

The unmistakeable feeling of eyes on me

In electronic shops and Korean clothing stores

The look that teachers gave me the first day of class

When I plopped down swagfull in the middle of the class

That slowly disappeared as I raised my hand

Over and over again, slaying questions

Like Lancelot and dragons

The first choice in PE when football season came around

Little did they know that I sucked

It hurt and hurt and scarred and scarred

Until I left

Leaving the catacombs of high school and adventuring

Into the field of college

Where I learned abolitionist rhymes

And King descendent cultures

Where a black president was possible

And white people weren’t as different as I was

And black people weren’t as different as I felt

Where judgment by the color of one’s skin

In a different culture is different

That we could as easily be accepted or rejected

By our accent than the color of our skin

That you are less black for not knowing

That there is an exit to cultural structure

That we are only hear through our minds

That the physical is a restraint that can be surpassed

Where being black meant nothing more

Than being me