Sunday, January 22

What It Means To Lie



To lie is

1)  To make better than. 
Fortified fruit or 
genetically modified piece of pie. 
Perhaps the blueberry batch has gone soft
between the teeth;
the baker plumps a pump of ick
into the root of it
and voilĂ ! 
Its truth may not satisfy 
but mmm how it tastes twice as sweet.

2) To make less than.
I meeeaaannn
Does it really matter 
Who spilled the milk or let it go sour?
What’s millions of lives lost long as the west was won?
See? There, between the thumb and forefinger:
the beauty of being is broken.
Chunk of ice belittled,
and yet the avalanche is gaining momentum.

3) To make equal to
It is always 
Hell hath no fury and
wrath of God wringing around your neck
an apocalyptic trick of the tongue.
But rarely, Jehovah, my Light and my Trust
I kneel before you, majestic. 
Daddy, have I made you proud?

Saturday, December 31

A Reckoning



Tip-toeing atop my gut,
The cock crow echoes upward
and out.

An ordinary rooster could never:

Look me square in the face and label me liar—
“You’re one fraudulent claim away from
bragging rights at recess.”
But an imposter is nothing more than a
Sheet of black ice imposing on a truth;
And how slippery this bird that won’t perch!

Always an ill-fit flit of wind and ransom
 bargaining with my blood
(Even now with my stake bubbling bruises 
purple and red;
How many times can one woman cheat death 
before her Lord
And you ask me to deny him?)

First it is the serpent’s slander
“Is it really so?”

When we both know
The rooster won’t crow come morning.

About// hope

Postscript// bit of a spin on Peter’s denial at Mark 14:72

Saturday, December 10

The Unwitnessed Fall of a Forest



The cynic in me feels a storm raging on a cloudless day.
Said day begs me to see its potential:
“I can sift the silk from the spider”
Said day swears.

Of course it cannot.

The tree in the forest has fallen 
Whether we’ve acknowledged the rot in its stump,
Weak roots pulled taut and tired.
The branches are barren
And still we are demanding silk of the spider?

Still we are waiting for the devil to do good.

Perhaps it is the silence
After every bough has bowed gracefully in solitude 
That the whole earth will remember 
What it really was
And what it was not.



postscript// if a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it...

Monday, August 22

Conjunctions (on Giving & Receiving)


At what point in the history of black women 
Were we burdened in blaze?

Did not wake up this morning itching to emasculate
and then spontaneously combust.

Would rather not understand the sharp edges 
of miscegenation, 
how that which is meant to coalesce 
Could cut so vividly and deep.

No, but 

I, too, crave unicorns, 
kisses the beat of butterfly wings
and other elusions.

Allusions not rampant with sex or slavery
But commas in the flesh;
I mean, living, breathing semicolons.
A man threadbare and ready.

Hands wide open,

Saturday, August 6

Why would God be a Black woman?


It’s catchy?

Paints a human
 supernatural, 
All fairy wings and scintillating breasts?

I guess?

God only knows how I, 
All snot and sweat and eye boogers of black woman
Could ever.

But deep down, you knew that already.

Knew this flesh and thigh and rib bone
Could not save you

The same way you knew a blue-eyed baby Jesus 
would not save you
and yet he was painted just so.

The sun of Israel never stood a chance.
The half-blood of an Asian?
(Yeah, but that God-half though…)

Is the Most High
(kicked-back over the Amazon,
Fork-tailed woodnymph interlaced between his toes
zephyr and orchid crawling round his ankles—
his glorious footstool)
Is He not a spirit?

Or will you fight yourselves to the death trying to prove Him otherwise?

John 4:24

About// we live in a world so offended by truth that it is labelled as enemy. there is no superior or supreme race, but then, deep down you knew that already.

Friday, June 10

Oil and Water


Look! The mountain drip slick with metal
Drip bullets drip bodies drip blood

Raw iron
Ironically 
Is unassuming at best
Silver hands in his pockets, eyes unfixed on everything in particular 
Even from here I can see that he is dreaming

But when finally is concentrate 
Would annihilate nations at the flick of his flint wrist.

From across the valley, clay dust scales the mountain’s peak
Bentonite drinks whole all that surrounds it.
It is parched of reason, brittle and breaking at every conjecture
A nonmalleable god fit for the furnace.

At a distance one could mistake the iron and the clay 
To be friendly— smug branches of the same vine 
Brothers even, a genetic clone of the other

But

Magnetize and magnify;
No, I mean really hold the weight of the mountain in the palm of your hand.
Do you see it?
How repulsed they feel by their own byproduct?

So clay says to iron, he says:
“If only I could purchase our final dissolution”

“Indeed. How many peoples would pay the price
For our disaster?” Iron smelt.

Iron smelt death closing in,
hooves of a white stallion 
reeked of their own free demise.

About: the dual Anglo-American world power

Daniel 2:34

post script// of course, this is just a poem; for a detailed explanation of this bible account check out the source Jehovah has provided! 


Saturday, April 2

Two Perspectives on Privilege part 2


 II. 


Everywhere I go 
there is a drooling man
demanding I fall in love with him
and I can’t for the life or death 
of me figure out 
why

If you have never been raped before, it is like this:
some poor swine bound to the slaughter
by a noose, heartless for sport.

There are no strawberries or ranunculi,
just the hunter chock full of cock-knowledge
That what is necessary, what is inevitable,
is within his godpower to accomplish.

about// rapists, demons and the whole self-entitled breed of people

postscript// people who choose to ignore the problem are often worse than the problem itself