That new millennium dime/

this one

a defining dime

like when you look back and see

you/got grown/learned sumthin/

this one was not hollow/ but it didn’t smell like an unill wind

you had to dig deep/shit got lost

hot buttered soul/the godfather of soul/ms. abbey

michael moon walked into immortality/we lost shit

rights/innocence/the ability to pretend ignorance/

descendants of stolen afrikans lost centuries of ground

and the house on it

we lost shit

stelly/graham/grant/tucker/

the hood is on fire

the cowboys have come to settle the land

in west oakland/south berkeley/east oakland/hunters point

easy access baby

you moved to antioch

fresno/

sacramento/

out to bay point/

the police and the army merged

dsa/hsa/fbi/cia/opd/hap/fu

skip to my motha killinnnnng lou

shoot you/ ya mama/ and ya baby cousin too/

need a muzzle on the army/on my street/

nasty buiznezz this dime

mask off

in the street/ do you hear me now/

talkin to you/ what time do you think it is?/ kinda dime

you still here?/how long/

ya think its bad now/

wait till the smoke clears/

should have listened/opened your eyes/now you in the forest

somebody stole the breadcrumbs/and the rose garden closed for good

heavy dime

allthechangeyoucanmake

obama

onedayuwill

hard dime/hit the bottom/keep on conning

wanna rub his head

he just a man

made

the band is playin

we all just dancin

don’t hate/he got a big dance floor/dont hate/same dance floor you been bleedin on/you can hate/but you gonna pay for the wax & the tap shoes / thats this dime

last breath kinda hustle

watch the lights go out

gotta blame somebody

clean out the safe and give

that harvard nigga the keys

somebody gotta take the fall

poor skip gates kinda dime

jaileveryotherblackmanyousee

if you can’t kill em where they stand kinda dime/

heavy/

don’t talk/reading this poem might cost you a job dime/

that new milli dime weighs a ton

might drop on you/

make a 5 star general resign/saw something

condelessa didn’t see/or saw pass/hell of a dime

bushes/a brother/bombs/bankruptcy/

/where were we/

talkin bout that dime

where prophets words/ were prophetic

/but only rich folks profited/

true soothsayers remain

invisible/ to the deaf/unheard/ by the blind/marginalized

by the puppeteers/

the wolves/

who watch us sheep/

little need/ we sleep on our feet/

heavy dime/a decade

where decadance & madness/paired- a lopsided dance/copious

consumption/ chased by need/seeded in the belly/

of those/never meant to have/ever/bitter

roots and poisoned fruit/the gun

is loaded/johnny cant read/but he can shoot

wounded dreams explode/it was up hill both ways/the load was always heavy/

take em for the funeral plots they brought

the dead don’t know

zombie times/hard to tell the dead from the living/standing round talking bout nuthin

while the forest heats to a boil/feed em fish/let em die/free the land/resettle it/

currency over/flags/culture/ethics/people

world got smaller dime/we can all get it

make you wanna hollar/they watch and put it on the news/shoot up your funeral dime

heavy/johnny got plymouth rock tied to his neck/he waited too long to go/

hung around too long/mad sheep dis-ease/we hung around too long

the wolves are laughing and night is still falling.

Heavy.

The Dime  is one of the poems from  That New Millennium Dime Collection.