8 miles down a black road, hoping to smash before the crash.Hoping to bubble and ball before the sun comesup. Cool breeze gives me dap. Early morning deer escapeinto the last exhalationsof night. No one knows male head- space, like loose gravel and Angry Noise. Crisp air high steps for a few more hours, takingContinue reading “Heavy is the Head Space”
Tag Archives: free verse
Never Attach Breaths to Conformity
Hang a left on Volvo Parkway. This Chesapeakething got blues in the veins,swag in the pockets. We craft vibes, weaving in andout of traffic patterns. GoBIG or go home. The route ispaved with good intentions,bones, and scattered goals. Don’t let your flesh touch the floor, they say. Keep your headon a swivel, document where theContinue reading “Never Attach Breaths to Conformity”
Refusing to Eat Polluted Pies
Fake praises fall on deaf ears. I submit to no dead sun or man or woman or upright snake or politician,sporting a power tie, and repressive beliefs. This dystopia smokes and changes. Traffic signals burn night, like tall djembes in a Black art gallery, in Ghent. In Ghent, I mis-behave. Jazz drips from fingertips. VersesContinue reading “Refusing to Eat Polluted Pies”
State of Mind: No Party Lines
A crooked smile stretches across a busy street. River Birch South yawns and pushes the day’s hungry button. Angry. Capitalism needs its pound of flesh and bone to feel whole. WHOLE. Greed Matters. Lives don’t. Ignore geno- cide, allow brutality to breathe and grow strong. Lethal. An idea worth its weight in tax dollars, wars,Continue reading “State of Mind: No Party Lines”
I Offer this Country Resistance
Studying Daylight. She ain’t been right in decades. Trying to outlast the metal jaws of this machine. This beast is a savage, flaunting patriotic colors, slogans, and catch phrases. In a different headspace, navigating hostile water. I walk a tight- rope, balancing goalsand hate and scars and fears. Numb the skin. Numb the skin. WatchContinue reading “I Offer this Country Resistance”
Suffocating Skin
Scrape knuckles againstfigurative concrete, looking for daylight, tucking earbuds into ears, listening to Fela Kuti. Traffic blurs. To be human is to walk along a tightrope. I levitate, hover above polluted frequencies. Above the fray is wherelesser gods like to find sanctuary. Cool, like jazzy rhythms vibrate beneath my steps. This path is heavy. TheContinue reading “Suffocating Skin”
No Filter Needed
No filter needed. Hostile smile tells the tale. This poem needs no introduction. Anarchy is written on its skin, as well as on liberated sky. Forget the constant panic in this dystopian nightmare with patriotic colors wrapped around eyes that refuse to see value (RESISTANCE), a value that contradicts the crumbs of rancid apple pies,Continue reading “No Filter Needed”
Shape a Dream/ Apply Muscle
Woke up to thismorning hustle. James Brownscreams them proud-like riffs to start another day. The belly of the machine is funky and fatal. Breathe after my own fashion. I saybreathe after my own fashion. Togamble with sun- light, like God owes me a favor. Like the Most Highclutches a black steering wheel and swerves alongContinue reading “Shape a Dream/ Apply Muscle”
I Will Breathe After My Own Fashion
Leaning into Identity–a scarred child break- ing the bars of a colonial cage. Rage is temporary (sometimes). Pleasant, like Jill Scott singing about living a golden life or like Bobby Womack crooning–110th Streeton his mind. No mercy for leaderswho use power, like an eraser, jazz-like, scrubbing surfaces for definitions of power or splashes of theContinue reading “I Will Breathe After My Own Fashion”
Swerving Into Machine
Labor beneath cosmos, trying to transform American ideas, lessons, brutalmoments. Brake lights hum, pulse.We call this thing liberation. Snakes walk upright, like pigs of strange jazz. Balancing their weight on trotters. Snatching them souls for this funky machine. She ain’t wrappedtoo tight! I swerve into relentlessgamble, rolling loaded dice, walking along a tightrope, trying toContinue reading “Swerving Into Machine”
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