wade in the water

Brad Brewer, 1971, published in Right On! Black Community News Service.
This is a good example of art that recognizes, identifies, and condemns the structure of antiblackness in u.s. empire.

"Until the killing of Black men, Black mothers' sons, becomes as important to the rest of the country as the killing of white mothers' sons, we who believe in freedom cannot rest..."
--Ella Baker
 "I'm not going to die, and even if I do die, I'm not going to die nobody's hypocrite."
--Assata Shakur

The Unforseen and the smoke
from aaaaaaaall that history
crowding out vision of the way
forward.

They wrote the rules so you couldn't
get here, or that if you did get
here you would be a coward
forevermore
after all they put you through to get here.

But here you are. Ain't no coward.
Maybe some PTSD. No coward though.

Crouch at the edge
of the clearing called
amerikkka,
of the vastness of play,
of war, of bliss, of gitmo,
of a wasteland beneath high-rise condos
starting at $750,000,
with nothing but the bag of tools
looted out of the katrinas,
broke out with the assatas of yestermoment,
heavy on hip.

And Imani, faith. Breathe in.
Hands held and ready.
We move together. Silent.
Ears tuned.

Whoever said don't look down
was a liar, that's where they
hide that shit, stepped in it,
and almost lost it all that time.

Fuck it.

Look everywhere.

But true forward is that way.

Yup. Think so.

Cuz if it were the other ways,
it would have worked by now.

No way to find pleasure
in the tearing
after what feels like
500 years of rape.

No idea how to make it through.

Maybe this time.

Image from video of the Barack Obama-Hillary Clinton sponsored murder of Afrikan leader Muammar Gaddafi. Gaddafi was considered a threat to white supremacist interests for many reasons, but the biggest one was his attempt to establish a currency based on Africa's gold resources. This move would have meant independence from western financiers for a continent of people that the west is presently starving.

Not yet. Patterollers take your balls they catch you.

Come on, Blackman, you and me.
Do it.

Never that. Not again.

The last one hurt so bad and cost so much.
I don't know that it's in me.
Feel hairs rise
at the creeping of history,
of normative time
just over shoulder,
of shame, got beat
that last cycle
and too much pride not to say
fuck it and risk stumbling
as long as it's that way,
think so, think that's forward.

No idea how it will go down.
Dug down. Broke down last time.

Let's pick the moment.
Then cut from cover.
Crush the fear into vapors
and push it out. Go off balance
headlong into the rush of time.

Imani is the wind at your back,
the collective last breath
of the beloved ancestors
as they dove into that
black black atlantic,
and we all do that some kinda way.

Faith all that is left
after you can't even
sweat no more,
after they've burned
everything else away.

Stay true.

Strap up.

Study up.

Rise up.

Break through.

Communicate. Yes.

That way.

That much we can agree on.

_______________________
copyright 2014 by Omar Ricks