Running to Find

I’m running away

Don’t try to catch me

I can’t catch myself

I’m already ahead of myself

My feet keep moving

I’m getting farther away

I’m out in the realms of space

Maybe, I’ll find myself one day.

The Wind Will Set You Free

The green reeds quietly sway eastwards as the sun fades, casting its shadow over the simmering horizon.  A large boar gently emerges from the shaded mudded creek, closes its eyes, and lets the gentle breeze harden the mud on its face.   When the boar opens its eyes, the flitter of its eyelid causes the mud to break. The mud falls like bits of sand and gently dances in the air like pollen.  The boar is free.

A black-footed ferret gazes up into the oak tree.  The bark of the tree is cold and wetted with the first year’s snowfall.  No matter how much she tries, she cannot climb.  Her eyes are fixated on a particular branch of the oak tree; on that branch rests a robin nest.  The mother robin is away,  the black-footed ferret is a mother too.  She can hear her kits high pitched whimpers crescendo in the wind.  She cannot leave this tree.  The crescendos heighten, and heighten, and heighten.  The black-footed ferret’s gaze focuses on the rattling branch, and then to swiftly to the robin nest which hangs by a thread.  The nest collapses, the eggs fall on the bedded snow with hardly a crack.  The black-footed ferret is free.

The night sky is clouded; the moon emerges from time to time through the clouds. It emerges long enough for the little girl to count its craters, its crevices, and dark spots before it once again vanishes.  The girl sits on a black swing in a small park that only she knows of.  Her fingers grasp the swing‘s alloy chains, but she lacks the energy to swing. Her eyes are red and watery, her head furrowed, her lips downcast like the moon, and her nose sniffles away.  She lets go of her grasp on the alloy chains, and buries her face into her delicate palms. She’s all alone.  Suddenly, a tender gust engulfs her.  Goosebumps emerge under the thickness of her jacket.  The gust holds her tight. Although the green grass, wooden fences, window panes, and trees too bend, the wind is focused on her. It gently grasps her tightly.  She inhales the friendly gust through her nostrils, and lets it rest in her body. The gust dries her water eyes, and her hair blows without inhibition.  The young girl is free.

The wind blows and blows. Through summer and fall, through winter and spring, through times of plenty and times of famine, through times of joy and times of hardness the wind blows.  In your darkest moments and your deepest triumphs, in your light hardships and soft agonies, in your heavy burdens and joyous burdens, the wind blows.  Just like night turns to day and just like the freshness christens the morning air after a night’s rain, the wind blows.  It blows without volition and causes all things to pass.  So, in the servitude of acrimony, the melancholies of melancholy, the nightmares which exist to eyes wide open unburdened with sleep.  Remember like the mudded boar emerging from the creek. Remember lik the black footed ferret gazing up the oak tree.  Remember like the little girl grasping the swing’s alloy chain on that moon covered night.  Remember, just like them, that the Wind will set  you free.

                                                                                                                                         

Twas the Night Before Christmas

It was the night before Christmas, and all through the old house.

Not a single creature was stirring, not even a cooking mouse.

Bubbling Eyes closed warmly, not a single lip asleep with frown

Because gay hearts knew jolly ole Saint Nick was coming to town

Little Kwery sat, arms crossed, angry on the hardwood floor

Kwery was seated, legs crossed, firmly blocking the front door

Eyes wide open, he slept for days to be awake on this Christmas eve

An ornamented tree (stood) in the corner, but Kwery still did not believe

                                                                                       

He was far past the terrible two’s, now a bright and bold eight

Now, he was 2 cubed, his horror had been over 4 times as great

He kept a glass of milk to his left, and a plate of cookies to his right

Angry at Santa, but if Santa came, he still deserved at least a bite

Yet, he didn’t believe in that man, that Santa Claus never ever came

Year after year, Kwery’s hopes would rise, but it always ended the same

No chocolate candy in the red stockings, no glistening presents under the tree

No gift cards on the table, Kwery would whimper “Santa doesn’t care about me.”

His friends would play with bicycles, action figures, videogames, cars,

Elmo dolls, footballs, toy guns,  and even space ships equipped with stars

But  Kwery would play with nothing nothing, not a single gift had he received

So he became starkly convinced over the years that he had just been deceived

Santa Clause wasn’t a jolly old man, instead he was an ugly gluttonous fool

A cantankerous old man that refused to live by the timeless golden rule

Treat others how you want to be treated, so for EVERY kid he should be giver

For if Kwery had magical elves and reindeer, then he would ALWAYS deliver!

So, Kwery sat on that wooden floor, and refused for a second to close his eyes

Because his daddy had promised him that that this night Santa would surprise

Kwery’s dad worked as a janitor through college, and he now was an engineer
Kwery remembered his father's promise that “Christmas will be different this year”

Kwery was unsure how his father had anything to do with Santa Clause giving gifts

Or how his dad having a job had anything to do with the years Santa had missed

So Little Kwery sat, arms crossed, indignant for hours waiting for Santa to emerge

And he would brave the whole night, a feat that takes an 8 year old great courage

And when the clock struck 12, and Kwery’s heart began to beat with doubt

He saw a figure with a large beard and red cloth and a red hat slowly come out

The figure didn’t come from the chimney; he didn’t come from the front door,

He didn’t come from the window, Kwery looked to see if he came from the floor.

To Kwery’s best memory and recollection the figure came from the room of his dad

Well, as long as it really was Santa Clause; Kwery guessed that that wasn’t that bad

The man had red clothes like Santa, a beard, gray hair, and he was fat like Santa too

And when he said, “HO HO HO!, ”as he handed  Kwery a gift, Kwery knew it had to be true

A sparkling smile spread wide across Kwery’s face, and he giggled in blissful uninhibited glee

And he merrily placed the gift Santa Clause gave him under the ornamented Christmas tree

Then he gave Santa a hug, the cookies, the milk, and apologized for doubting him at all

But as Santa left, Kwery couldn't help but notice Santa and his dad were equally as tall

They had the same eyes, same skin color, and same walk with how the right foot would lead

And when he hugged him, he noticed they had the same warmth, feel, and umber smell indeed

 Then Kwery no longer felt sad about years of no gifts as he heard bells from his dad’s room jingle

For how could he ever have been jealous of the other children when his own daddy was Khris Kringle.

 MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL & TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT! 

Soliloquy of the Eternal Negro

Take a look into my eyes,

Take a deep deep look,

A look so deep that the gaze causes you to drown away into my thoughts

I am much older than Katrina, and I am much older than riots in 1992 and 1965,

I am much older than eyes that closed that allowed a preacher to dream,

And I am much older than Malcolm Little when he knelt before Elijah Mohammad,

I’m so old that I can remember the Great Migration to the North, and, honestly, I was old then too

Because even though I was free to leave the South and go north, I vividly remember 1865 when I became free, period.

That was the day when I looked at my calloused hands blistered with the hulls of the cotton which I picked for centuries,

And, I clenched my fist and let the blood drip from my palms to unpicked cotton below and cried to God that I would Never Ever be a slave again!

To this day, I’ll never know if he heard me;

I’ll never even know if he was my God, or just the oppressors who I once called “Massah”

Honestly, I don’t remember who my God was, I don’t even remember my name, or where I came from

I lost that all when they chained me to that damned ship and brought me here

For 3 months I lay in whirling darkness, envying the humanity given to rats and roaches

Fearing them too, as they gnawed at the dead and ate our handcuffed emaciated flesh

I lost my sons and daughters, my nieces and nephews, my mother and father and friends in that hell

Those who didn’t die were thrown overboard to lessen the load of the ship

Thrown overboard like dirty rags, thrown overboard like helpless dirty rags

Their screams still haunt me so much that my eyes forever became cold

You see, beneath this nappy hair, big lips, and dark skin, I am over 400 years old

Now, I know what you’re thinking.  Black don’t crack.

We do, you don’t believe me? Take a look at the whip marks on my back.

Then take a look at the bone protruding from my ankle where they chained me,

Take a look at my limping knee where over 30 times they clubbed me

Or pass me a tissue, and I’ll cough up the blood from generations of beatings

I crack.  I bruise. I cry. I feel pain.  And, at times I’ve wished I was dead

I’m human.  It still brings me to tears to say that.

Nothing about my life has been humane.

I remember 1776 like it was just yesterday. 

I fought in that war; I fought for the freedom of the United States.

I fought because the truth was “self evident” that all men are created equal.

Little did I know, I was only 3/5ths of that man.

I gave my life to fight for the freedom for what?

At the end, I was more of a slave then I was before.

When that revolutionary war ended, I basked in the glorious sun and extended my arm in hope of being called equal

But, in my extended hand they placed a shovel and told me to dig

The once glorious sun then beat on me causing beads of sweat to drop from my body like daggers,

Its beating only matched when they mercilessly whipped me for digging the coarse tundra too slowly

And they called me a word that to this very day sends shudders from my spine down to the earth below so much so that I lose my balance and can hardly stand when I hear it.

Nigger.

Weeping as the dripping sweat caused my fresh foot long wounds to burn

And blood-curdingly screaming, I gripped the ragged shovel as they poured salt on my wounds

I cried, “Why must I dig massah! MASSAH! Why!”

“To bury your hopes and dreams, nigger.” He replied with a menacing cackle,

“To bury your hopes and dreams.”

I hadn’t dreamed since the slave ship, and I lost hope after that day too.

Whatever hope I had left boomed from my bowels like a benediction,

 The hope that that Sweet Chariot would swing low and carry me home.

Or the hope to “Keep my hand on the plow”

Amidst my hollow hymns, I fathered thousands of children.

Some were my own blood, and they hated me for being cursed with my hands

Others were the seeds of my daughter’s rape; they hated me because they had the hands of my Massah

Cursing me, spitting at me, throwing rocks at me because they hated the fact

That one drop of “me” made them ME!

And that no matter how much perm, presses, peroxide or bleach they pampered on themselves

That even after the Civil War; they would never be able to escape ME!

I’ve been free for over 150 years now. 

Ha, some freedom if you ask me.

They promised me 40 acres and a mule,

But instead they gave me black codes, Plessy, and Jim Crow.

Before they cut off my tongue in slavery when I tried to read like them,

Now they cut off the funding for my school so I’ll never read like them.

I finally got my sons and daughters to rally with me like panthers

We united to lift ourselves from the pits of despair

Rallying behind Huey Newton and Bobby Seale

We wore black to symbolize our new-found pride in black.

And, it ended blackly, as they sent discord to rip through our chords

Once proud black, now stained with crippled blue and bloody red

And crack rock contraband sprinkled in the middle

So that my sons face life imprisonment

So, their sons and daughters don’t know them

And, once again, they don’t know me.

I fought in wars and was put in the front line to die

Considered “expendable”, my operation was suicide

I’ve fought in every war and every major battle for this nation

I fought as a slave, I fought as a segregated man, and I still fight

Instead of segregation, now I fight because socioeconomics leaves me at the bottom

I tried to climb up the totem pole.

I climbed day and night for over 20 years.

As I climbed, my slave clothes were replaced with business suits.

And when I slept, the wind whispered into my ears to be like them.

When I got to the top of the pole, so high above the clouds that I could hardly stand

I looked down through binoculars to my daughters and sons hungry jaws

They were eager to climb up like I had

I threw down a rope, to try to pull up my daughters and sons

The rope was torn to shreds; they called my action too affirmative

The pole was then covered in slime pasted in crack rock.

My daughters and sons try to climb, but they didn’t get high up the pole

They only got high, so the earth shook beneath them and they fell further into a pit.

Now, I struggle to even get them back to where they were before.

I’ve lived for over 400 years and I’ve seen it all.

I’ve drowned in my own thoughts, and brought myself back to life.

My dreams have been shattered like porcelain dropped from a tower

And my hope has been chopped up like thousands of fiery spores blowing ashes away in the wind

Yet, I continue to breathe in the air through my lungs and move forward.

From slavery, to black codes, from segregation, to Jim Crow,

From black panthers to crips, from being shipped in chains to being slashed by whips

Through it all, I rise.  Like the sun after dusk, I rise.

Like a single blossom, bathed in the waters of spring, I rise.

And like the clenched fist I throw up in the air, bearing the hope of my generation,

I WILL RISE.

I WILL RISE!