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I was blessed to see and I share what I see. This is post is relevant now as we celebrate Fences directed and starring Denzel Washington on the big screen and as my community melts and continues to stumble under the weight of Blackness in America. I am forever grateful to Wilson for talking to me — albeit after death and proud of him for being so noisy — he is still talking. Listen he is singing my song…pay attention, it may be your song too.
i saw jesus break dancing on
a corner in west oakland
right before the banks came
to steal black folks homes
he must have been a warning
he was beautiful homeless funky
dust flying from his dreads as he
contorted his self into shapes
that defied reason with syncopation
that was undeniable beating out
the truth in a dance of the times
jesus ditty bop bopping hyphy breaking
crunkly popping locks moon walking
juking his joints sliding electrically
to the holy ghost dancing on the
corner of pine & 11th he was
facing the old train station
(it ain’t there no more – condo’s)
or the freeway that roars like
an ocean at night early in the
morning making music
with the beeping trucks
of waste at the space
where the old center
of the world collided with
the end of the world
recycling the used to make way
for the shiny and new between
the lines of hungry children
marching single file to
free breakfast lunch programs
or maybe he was on the corner
Newton died on dancing
while parents search for
work that can’t be found
pack up houses after being
hit with balloons full of
piss water tossed
by colonial goons
to be reborn drowning
underwater landless with jesus
c-walking on the corner of 14th
& willow under the mural
before laying down in the middle
of the street on the yellow
line it must
have been a sign but
didn’t nobody pay attention
but i saw it
in the middle of the day
heat rising off the asphalt
jesus barefoot dancing
near the recycling center
(closed now: shut down
because it fed the unwashed
pushing carts full of waste
from the shiny & new) jesus
best not dance there
no more wonder what
happened to dancing jesus
must have been a message
but didn’t nobody hear it
as the trucks left with the
people & the dreams leaving
me to wonder where jesus
is dancing now
I am grateful for
the movements
created out of
praying with
your hands moving
lift us up
we will not fall
ever forward
like the love of mother’s
invincible
boundless
like the abundance
of fat godz
a lioness awake
circling prey
lines drawn
lines held
lines crossed
in the light
of burning
crosses
prayer with moving
hands crossed path
with dogs and hoses
hoods and nooses
spoke truth moving
standing on ground they
were building
heads high
hearts unbowed
fists in the sky
freedom in our sight
hands moving
living in prayer
religion is what you do
is your faith asleep
wake it up
move your hands
make something
praise something
raise something
fix something
change something
be something
start something
stop simply dreaming
& build something
build
move your hands
as you pray on it
lift us up
we will not fall
grateful for warriors
with prayer on their lips
and moving hands
don’t just talk about it
move your hands
be about it
I am grateful
when hearts and feet
follow each other
hands moving
dancing as fast as i can
don’t care whose looking
singing loud enough to wake the dead
moving hands
moving hands
moving hands
grateful
here
at the front of the line
showed up to make my voice heard
that’s what they say
here to pay for my ticket to the conversation
to be a part of the public sphere
here
words and names on pages and pages
words and names
bowed low
by the bullshit of polytrix
perplexed by
the amorality of polytrixsters
here
paying for my ticket to the conversation
soundtrack in my ear
‘have no fear’
praying tipping points
refusing the lesser of two evils
standing in my light
my truth my real reality
my feet in the ocean
face towards the graveyard
remembering to remember
how I used to believe
small brown hand over
my black heart my democratic
start dancing to the tune
played by my parents with
my great grand parents bones
we a bunch of refugees
migrating through the confines
of American’s dreaming
freedom from narratives
of origin soaked in blood
dreams that smell of cotton
dead buffalo Kentucky bourbon
and ferverent wishes
we
were somewhere else
here
living all outside ourself
trying to survive our skin
uphill sisyphus trying to get in
out of the whirlwind
here at the crooked table
where democracy ain’t saved
me here
shopping for new dealers
got my ticket
with the old brown and black ladies
a few black men
the droves of young peacock haired people
you can never tell what tune
they dance to dipped in privilege
oozing here-ness manifesting it everywhere
rolling back to the slave pens
sometimes beside you
sometimes dividing you
‘have no fear’
‘have no fear’
they buying guns and ammo by the barrel
smells of fear
Obama’s picture over the stage
TIME underneath it
it’s been time
was pass time when we came
it’t time to go again
we been refugees desparate to root
seeds spiraling in the wind
we are disaspora
brave & tragic
sign of perptural resistence
here
children playing on the playground
“you play too much
everybody play too much
I ain’t playing”
here
this used to be a black neighborhood
still here
‘have no fear’
here
sad and mad
thinking about the shit we never had
democracy could still free me
‘have no fear’
praying tipping points
and whats beyond
whispers say it’s all for sale
it’s a clown show
todays the parade
got my ticket to the charade
words and names on pages and pages
we dying for change
feel some kind of way
trying to maintain
all i know
it can’t stay the same
silence in the face of violence
people sleeping on the street
tents stretch far as eyes can see
walls of garbage
this won’t be my great grands harvest
we been refugees
running
praying
voting to get free
moving for opportunity
marching because of injustice
standing up even when it was just us
knowing this is beyond us
we pray for tipping points
if its time
bring it on
there are no more words
in this poem
ready
here
face towards the graveyard
feet in the ocean
here
I am grateful for the crossroads
here is where change can occur
choices and consequences
here is where we walk our heart
religion is what you do
the crossroads reveal character
intention, mettle, and upbringing
what you live for reveals more
that what you would die for
crossroads no right or wrong
but don’t get left in the liminal
gotta go
you going even if you standing still
you just not going to get nowhere
all praises to the crossroads
where princes become kings
and princesses are separated from queens
I am at a crossroad
I got the dice in my hand
I am grateful
*From “The Gratitudes” by A. Nzinga
http://www.oaklandrising.org/sites/default/files/images/images.jpeg
The Defermerys are alive,
says the beige council woman.
They may be living but
Bobby Hutton is dead
and we have renamed the park
to keep him alive
surely you understand
life and death eternally binary
we are binary people
live or dead
black or white
in or out of favor
out of office
out of the city
on the other side
out of time
out of life
outside of life
Bobby Hutton is dead
Denzil Dowell is dead
I hope they claimed a token
for Denzil somewhere in
Richmond I have cried on Center St.
after the sage burned out
& the egun gun danced
we claimed the corner
baptized it in the name
of Godz who favor drums
we let Huey know
we remember
to remember
lay claim to him in all his parts
elevating the genius accepting
that flawed humans are the
handz of the Godz
we remember to remember
a bowl of honey by the
cactus in the yard
we pray for the flower
& warriors who sacrificed
like graceful ocean divers
suiciding burning like fire
knowing they were never
meant to be slaves
their death marks the place
we crossed over
spirits walking waiting
to be claimed
we have renamed
Defermery and given it to
Bobby Hutton so that his spirit
has a place to grow
the beige
lady says –we can have the trees–
they are already ours
we have claimed them
she can not give us what we
have taken
— we don’t want wampum
popcorn and beads we have taken
what we need–
a place to remember
crossing over
slaves who refuse
burning like fire
burn baby burn
we honor the fire
we honor the flames
Long live Bobby Hutton
.image from Oaklandrising.org
https://goddessinspired.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/olokun-at-bottom-of-sea.jpg
under the water
looking up from the house
of Olukun
I will never eat from
an empty plate
I hold the rope
the path is cleared
I am in the water
the water is my mother
holding me in the presence
of my enemies
my brother passes
the cup it overflows
I am prosperity
I never thirst
I am abundant
over flowing
the blessed one
flowing uphill
endless deep oceanic
flow like ocean
waves following
and carving paths
I am underwater
in Olukuns’ house
servant and child
to the ancestors
who talk to me
telling me stay
on the path
the rocks are
there to remind you
you are capable
you are able
you are
& if you remember
to flow forward
over the rocks
you will never thirst
(c) A. Nzinga
image credit: https://goddessinspired.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/olokun-at-bottom-of-sea.jpg
you can’t be but so free
in a sorrowland
a place
you were forced to
used & discontinued
discarded to find a way
out of no way with obstacles
piled higher than the mast of
the good ship Jesus
stolen ancestors
wait for reciprocity
praying we overcome
they waiting
to inhale can’t breathe
still underwater even the ones
who did not jump from the ship
we are free to limbo free to continue
in limbo free to pop up from the bottom
of the ship to the white house but
can’t free ourselves from the narrative
of being disposable shot down regularly
like animals we
are preyed upon some
times preying on one another master
sick we sick trying to make
our ice as cold as his
we seek recovery from
pig scraps kool aid & commodification
while they make america great again
you can’t be but so free
when you wreak
or Ellison’s invisible blues while hyper
visibility dehumanizes you makes your
children targets
targeted for
destruction called public education
a prelude to incarceration or domestic
deportation eaten by a machine
we can’t touch but are crushed by
can’t be but so free when you
hooked on the hooks
but you think you fishing
divided against yourself
wondering why you can’t
get over as you look down
at your feet counting the
steps you took to get nowhere
in a rigged game where
lies like independence are celebrated
by conquers
you can’t be but so free
unless you overstand your duty
to resist exercise the freedom
to try
be free enough to
dare to struggle &
prepare to win like a promise
waiting to be fulfilled
till you do that
you can only be
but so free
in a sorrowland
(art for sale on a website that caters to racist) — you can’t be but only so free…
it is a time of fire
an age of rising
like waves on a
black sea we are
the pouring over after
being pressed down witness
fire on the water we are
the lesson of the lynching tree
the answer to cotton
the trespassers of language
undressing the weapons
hidden in ink
we are the dreams
projected from projects
the residual of slave hollars
before the rebellions
we are the pouring over
after pressing down
we have walked
miles in the rain & not
drowned we will light
the sun we come with
fire we are of fire & water
we are closer to the dust
knowing we fall like seeds
we come forth in abundance
thrive in the flicker
of the slimmest chance
we come bearing fire
born in a time where vanity
rules truth tellers are slain
poets are labeled mad & fire
is born tended
carried in bellies
hearts minds souls
hot like fire baby
we don’t want new dealers
we want to write a new deal
renegotiate the treaty papers
the terms of engagement
the boundaries of the public
sphere & all thoughts of
manifest destiny
we come with fire
fire heals & destroys baby
we don’t want a new dealer
in this time of callous
disregard the unwashed
walk along the river’s
edge wrapped in the echo
tapped out on iron
Ogun proceeds
Shango gathers the rear
the sound conjures
an unslave ditty
with a free style
cadence breaking
the air of ignorance
disrupting sinister off-key songs of
self-divined too big to fail
democratic failures playing
one note on the backbones
of the oppressed wrapped in lawless
law ink weapons protecting
invisible war criminals above
law stealing lying dirty hands
operation stealth cloaked in subliminal
sound bites selling us crazy
at market rate
talking heads full of schemes
no quarter offered
none asked
we have come with fire baby
to light paper houses
deconstructing language
writing the narrative of
rebellion burning with forward
motion on our breath
prayer is better than sleep
action more divine than prayer
movement is life we moving
proof of life baby
on fire with no more
time to dance you a jig
juggle two realities
pretend like you make sense
truth is a sword we got
one reality we refuse to
be crazy for you
might be a good time
for you to stop pretending
like you crazy too truth
is a sword cutting through
concocted innocence
perceived fragility
& delusions of supremacy
one reality
not invisible
carrying fire
forward motion on
our breath armed
with fire & truth
hot like fire baby
the story is being written
madness majick and infamy
spilling off the page too heavy
to carry we tip over under the weight
that rides dead center inside keeping
us off balance stumbling up hill
sometimes you got to grow wings
feed it to the wind go where the water
flows without sound we walk wounded
through lean slivers of real life distracted
forgetting to count the blessings
essential to the thought of continuing
we smell of struggle overcoming or the
effort of trying to distance ourselves from
that narrative hard to find even ground
movement is life so walking forward
is written on the inside of eyelids sewn
shut to reality like a nailed window shades
the light still spills through shadows every
where especially in bright light and in the
contemplation of the quantitative quality of
our lives we grow schisms like mushrooms
tended in the dark defying statistics
we are the confusing side of complexity
hanging like the moon off center
sometimes invisible
but still omnipresence
even when you can’t decipher its shape
we step over the bones
sometimes falling where other have fallen
sometimes using their falls to propel us
we keep walking going forward because
movement is life and we are alive walking
wounded on the bones of the fallen
and those who stood on them
before us holding up the sky
singing in the dark
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