Category: Poetry

Starving Contentment

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Like music swallows its bass inside the belly of the loud speakers their stomachs growl,
but they ain’t really hungry….
they just come to see what all the commotion is like….
they wanna know what all this poetry stuff is but……
they ain’t really hungry……
they just wanna see how pretty her pain is.

Revolutionary Youth

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I notice that young people like to engage into conscious conversation nowadays….
a mind heavy with questions a…..
bed of regret too slippery to hold onto any longer we linger on the brink of activism and righteous revolution but…..
like wild bulls in a net we are caught ironically by the same thirst for consciousness…….
breathtaking words and artificial intelligence that sound almost like life….
a quick fix of metaphors glossed over with the shine of illuminated intelligence
a mere ignorance in disguise
it is my hope
that before we start to think
we may first search the graveyard of our ancestors closets where we buried our minds
because it is evident….
that though we are inebriated of the euphoria of information….
we have yet to be informed.

Humility

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Humility is loving that which is poor
it is bringing oneself down
becoming a servant to an innermost consciousness
to appreciate that which is forgotten
and insignificant
to relapse back into a state of childhood
where even something as great as a piece of broken glass
seems innocent
where it is not glass
it is not dangerous
it is just a mirror into which we see ourselves

Cousin

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She walks but she sleeps…
she sleeps her way down 35th street,

Chicago’s State Streets.
The project life booming
lights
camera
action,
whistles blowing the street life calling
undressing her body with its eyes
for she blooms into this new body just as suddenly as the sky rises
she rises
into womanhood…….
since that first flow of blood sent hormones racing against waves she sleeps
with those waves
feelings of pretend love from the streets
swallow that pill of ignorance,
dazed in ecstasy
she sleeps.

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Hennessy bottles, homo sags and Baphomet signs,

he sleeps
getting this paper either on the basketball court or the recording studio he stays true to the streets, so he thinks.
Blind hormones and rap songz creating another generation of sleepers
too bad he doesn’t know
that by the age of 10 he’s already red listed as one of NYPD’s takers.
polished A-k 47’s eagerly await just 8 more years until it’s their turn to accidentally
shoot away what consciousness he’s got left.
But he sleeps
and she sleeps
living dreams to the fullest only to never realize that it was just a dream
living life to the fullest only to die
wake up and not live.
never giving ourselves the opportunity to realize that sleep is just the cousin of death.
Because the almighty never sleeps

and his righteous angels you see they don’t sleep
and the messiah died
dying physically
only to wake up from this sort of temporary sleep because he was ordained to never sleep again.
cause you can only live once…..physically
your body’s life fading away in the distance
rats and insects tearing away at past dreams of disobedience
but will you ever wake up from this past slumber and really live?
or will you sleep,
and sleep,
and sleep…
to become more acquainted
with the cousin of death.

The Relationship – My Love Affair with Poetry

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Smitten.

You know the feeling

that refreshing taste of newness

the aching agony that occurs merely from having to wait

until you can see him again

the love sick hurricane in your stomach

just to hear him say your name

the sweat that hides itself beneath your fingertips

when he’s around

the sudden sense of laughter

upon seeing his face

because you know like he does

the secret that lets its guard down

upon the blinking of your eyelids

the pace of a heartbeat

when a word of kindness escapes his lips

you know it

the feeling of fresh love

like the aroma of gourmet coffee

like when the caffeine simply invites you

like the pupils of his eyes when they mentally undress you

because the kindness pouring forth from these thoughts

is strangely exhilarating

the feeling that reminds you

why you were ever single,

the masculinity of a voice

strong, and incredibly calm

whatever I could do to convince poetry that it was necessary that we speak

was a chance to breathe,

for he was a ventilator

and I just needed air.

so I rushed home just to grab a book

or pry open my diary

and hold his thoughts in my hand until my paper

bled its first period.

Deeper.

Over time, we got closer and I became more open

I grew out of childhood

and demanded more attention from my lover

I became jealous and obsessive with my need to be seen with him

in the classroom, in the library, and late into Open mic nights

I ate up words with the speed of speech

and wrapped alliterations

around alphabets

like it was oxygen.

Smoking lyric

and sipping on rhythm slow

like the stride

of a black man

Commitment.

It was no longer convenient to lock me away,

cover me under the flap of notebooks and journals,

it was time to come out of the closet.

I tried to stay focused really,

but paper had proved to be too cluttered

and too slow for us,

too polluted to allow the thing we’d attempted through privacy

to ever grow into what I needed

How could I allow our particular version of intimacy

to be buried by the commas and blue lines

and falling parenthesis that make up the creative world?

After all, we were in love and as such it was time for marriage

and the introduction of this relationship

into the mainstream

The way these words were so finely crafted

almost as if they wrapped themselves around my lips

and took trips inside my memories

Euphoria

any feeling this good has got to be a sin…isn’t it?

No,

What I’d stumbled upon was a gift and no,

this was not a transgression of law

this

was

love.