Tag: poem

Guest Feature-We Love Like the Sun Rise

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We kiss like the night
But we love like a sun rise
We love
like were far out there
Like
halos and moon rocks, and cosmos and jelly fish
We love
Like gravity
We love like autumn
the season where everything learns how to fall and we do
Fall
In love that night
You know, one day I’ll understand the earthquake crack from your pulse
I am the rhythm to any love song that made you want to exist.
So when the sun rises–anxious as it always is—
begins to yawn over the cusps of day
I will be here
may the wind lay us back onto our bed spreads where we can hold,
where we can touch,
where we can love
like the sun rise…

– Brook Yung, (excerpt)

The First Time

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The first time we made love was when you walked into my classroom
your eyes danced and moved graciously inside mine like
dancers carefully twirling to the sound of their own heart beats
and
we were young-er
got lost in your mind and day dreamed about your beauty
could not wait to get to class the next day so that I may immerse myself in your intelligence
and like books I was open
(No wonder I like to read)
If loving you meant I couldn’t go beyond the pupils of your eyelids
I didn’t mind
cause
your lips spoke confidently and proud
so that I hung onto every word
swinging back and forth I was a kid at a playground
your beauty was biblical
from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet this was prophecy
thought the teacher was a waitress asked her if I could have another round of you
let’s be realistic
this thing was futuristic like foresight
every time you opened your mouth I took road trips into your memories
and for my blood racing I could not hide the joy
trying to catch my breath after falling into your smile
we were connected
too young to understand this love at first sight sensation I could have been dreaming
or maybe it was “Just my Imagination”
cause I was dancing
moon walking into complete relaxation
your last name should have been Jackson
cause you was a hit
and I could not lie
cause I ran home just to go to bed and wake up to the sun rise
cause it reminded me of you
you didn’t know it but my nose was so open I took notes
I was singing,
a sucka to every sound of the harmonious humility that escaped like convicts from your lips
I was convicted
cause I loved you too early…

Guest Feature – Mother to Son

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Well, son, I’ll tell you:
Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
It’s had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor
Bare.
But all the time
I’se been a-climbin’ on,
And reachin’ landin’s,
And turnin’ corners,
And sometimes goin’ in the dark
Where there ain’t been no light.
So, boy, don’t you turn back.
Don’t you set down on the steps.
‘Cause you finds it’s kinder hard.
Don’t you fall now
For I’se still goin’, honey,
I’se still climbin’,
And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.

 
– Langston Hughes

Guest Feature – Language

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Silence is one part of speech, the war cry
of wind down a mountain pass another.
a stranger’s voice echoing through lonely
valley’s, a lover’s voice rising so close
it’s your own tongue: these are the keys to cipher,
the way the hawk’s key unlocks the throat
of the sky and the coyote’s yip knocks
it shut, the way the aspens’ bells conform
to the breeze while the rapid’s drum defines
resistance. Sage speaks with one voice, pinyon
with another. Rock, wind her hand, water
her brush, spells and then scatters her demands.
some notes tear and pebble our paths. Some notes
gather: the bank we map our lives around.

 

– Camille T. Dungy

Signed__________

Formless and empty am I
soft to a fathers touch
cool liquid moving throughout my being wrapped tightly around,
feet tucked underneath me stretching for miles around.
formless and empty am I,
formless and empty was I,
before you perverted my ground,
before feet touched down inside my heart,
before outstretched arms tore my world apart.
because formless and empty was I,
alone,
sitting perfectly next to myself,
but not alone,
not
with myself but with my father
providing a kind of intimacy for the trees and for the grass and for the animals
for my father’s creation
for his obedient creation I sat peacefully,
and then you came,
you came and perverted my ground
until now silent screams scream for my non-existence
confused minds await the day in which I will exist no more
silly minds unable 2 fathom that I cannot cease 2 exist no more
for I will be shaken, tossed and moved, but I cannot cease 2 exist no more
still, the sign of my demise many pray for
and I’m sorry,
but I cannot accept your apology,
no Band-Aid will release such pain from swollen sores.
because you see my waters,
my waters are poison
and my ground is dull
my air is not even pure anymore!
woe to my fathers’ children who were once able to dance and shout inside of me
but because of your perversion they cannot beat inside of me!
I cannot nourish them,
sing happy songs that will comfort them
In the wind, blowing ever so softly
the wind,
my breath upon their lifeless cheeks
pretentious joy from half dead leafs and waters that fill with blood
now leaks
sadness,
and with sadness they look up to me
but they cannot do it
they cannot respect me because you worshipped me
you bowed down to the created instead of the creator
and left your filth on my body as residue of this relation
coughing,
I can still smell the gun smoke,
from your many wars.
and I apologize,
for I cannot forgive what you’ve done to me
what you’ve made me out to be
when you raped me of this virginity,
and left blood in precious dirt
I dedicate this letter to you men

Signed, The Planet Earth

Guest Feature – The Earth is a Living Thing

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is a black shambling bear

ruffling its wild back and tossing

mountains into the sea

 

is a black hawk circling

the burying ground circling the bones

picked clean and discarded

is a fish black blind in the belly of water

is a diamond blind in the black belly of coal

 

is a black and living thing

is a favorite child

of the universe

feel her rolling her hand

in its kinky hair

feel her brushing it clean

– the earth is moving, Lucille Clifton

His Birth Pains

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There’s a woman
laying in the hospital
and armed with the next generation in her womb,
and she’s about to give birth real soon
she breathes
in another breath as her body jerks,
to the sound of the television… it is the news.
reporting another mass murder of black men
he moves
inside of her
tucking his head underneath his soft bones
she moans
at another kick
to her ribs
his tiny fingers have just curled around them
holding her insides with the delicate force of a newborn
he hesitates “This is it.”
The end of nine months only to see another nine years
of bars
he fears
this new place
leaving no more space
for his body to stretch out
than his face
pressed tightly against
the skin of his mother’s uterus.
Of this new world he thought he’d be curious
but the sounds of the outside has only made him furious
the sounds of police in the distance
kicking,
he kicks again this is resistance
forcing the woman into painful sensations
but he kicks
constantly
cause this is not an invitation to leave
it is a plea to stay
“Don’t worry lil man”, the doctor says, “Mama’s just a lil tense,
but he shutters at homelessness
debating to himself if to pass up his first breath is worth it
his ground iron
his heavens bronze
his prayers polluted like falling stars
trying to break lose what’s already bent
rocking his mother’s body once more
this can’t be heaven sent
but
it’s too late
something has pushed him out of his place
and its holding him tightly,
his screams echo, “let go of me.”
but he has already lost his authority
and he doesn’t even know his name
and these are just the beginning
of his birth pains.