I am 25 years old, black female poet
asking nigger can you kill
if they kill me it won’t stop the revolution.
I have been robbed it looked like
they knew that I was to be hit
they took my TV my two rings
my piece of African print and my two guns
if they take my life it won’t stop the revolution.
My phone is tapped my mail is opened
they’ve caused me to turn on all my friends
and all of my new lovers if I hate all black people
and all Negroes it won’t stop the revolution.
I’m afraid to tell my roommate where I’m going
and scared to tell people if I’m coming
Where did you come from, Mother , and why?
You slipped from the hand of Morn.
A child’s clear eyes have wondered why
Since the very first child was born.
What shall I do here, Mother and when?
You’ll dream in a waking sleep,
Then sow your dreams in the minds of men
Till the time shall come to reap.
What do me long for, Mother, and why?
They long for a star’s bright rays,
And when they have glimpsed at a tiny light
They follow with songs of praise.
Where does that star shine, Mother, and when?
It glows in the hearts of a few.
So close your eyes, while I pray, dear child,
Th
The women gather because it is not unusual to seek comfort in our hours of stress.
A man must be buried.
It is not unusual that the old bury the young though it is an abomination.
It is not strange that the unwise and the ungentle carry the banner of humaneness though it is a castration of the spirit.
It no longer shatters the intellect that those who make war call themselves diplomats.
We are no longer surprised that the unfaithful pray loudest every Sunday in church and sometimes in rooms facing east though it is a sin and a shame.
So how do we judge a man.
There is a tree, by day,
That, at night,
Has a shadow,
A hand huge and black,
With fingers long and black,
All through the dark,
Against the white man’s house,
In the little wind,
The black hand plucks and plucks
At the bricks.
The bricks are the color of blood and very small.
Is it a black hand,
Or is it a shadow????
Reference: Angelina Grimke
learn morecoltrane must understand how
I feel when I hear
some un-sunned-be-bop-jazz-man
try
to find the cause of a man’s hurt
soul ain’t nice it’s daddy’s backache
the blues my mother felt when she
bore me
in a rat-infested-harlem u.s.a.
its… mammas love and daddy’s hate-
doing it my way
survival motion set to music……
reprinted by permission of Earl J. Hooks.
