© 27 November 2006, The Griot Poet
“Cosmo Kramer” has left the building!
As Michael Richards launches a chilling tirade
Of the shade I'd overheard and seen at a Cross lit Klan meeting
During a JROTC overnight in NC we cadets happened upon amongst the trees…
You used the n-word a symbolic SEVEN times,
Added injury to insult describing a violent, sodomy crime,
“Stick a fork up” my rear
50 times for 50 years ago when WE were the de facto slave labor of the “land of the free; home of the brave”: building houses; picking fruit and cotton; working for pennies on the dollar (without health benefits)!
Our prophet, Marvin said:
“Makes me WANNA holler, throw up both my hands!”
As real soldiers like Rosa Parks, Corretta Scott and Martin Luther King Junior, Medger Evers, Malcolm X and others fought & DIED for us to “rock the vote” and get up
From the back of the bus for our
“Inalienable right” to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”: our brothers PAID for this abuse!
Your behavior has no reasonable excuse.
Your “penis envy” of Jerry Seinfeld evident, every star used the president of the hit show to boost their creds… not you!
I’ll be honest with you: I watched maybe three episodes of your hit show the whole TEN YEARS of “Much Ado About Nothing” to quote Shakespeare,
Since it is hard for me to digest “whites only” characters and NO black regulars on a show based in New York City (include “Friends” and “Sex & the City” in this offense!).
You looked as if you'd hit new heights after smoking a large CRACK pipe before you hit the stage!
I am enraged for my brothers that you made cushy public apologies to David Letterman, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson: for one,
We haven't watched much late night since they canned Arsenio Hall!
And, your little, well-acted pouting to the presidents of the National Action Network & Rainbow PUSH do you NO good at all!
You want redemption? You want a career?
Lean your ear to this advice and hold it dear:
It is not repentance
Until you humbly face those you've offended,
And offer DOUBLE restitution
Asked for in recompense.
Let me repeat it:
It is not repentance
Until you humbly face those you've offended,
And offer DOUBLE restitution
Asked for in recompense.
FACE the brothers you crudely fronted and be a MAN!
Until you do this,
You will not satisfy our
Sense of justice,
Else your career – such as it was – will be over, “past prologue”* and SPENT!
* “What is past is prologue.” William Shakespeare
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
50 Pesos a Day
© 20 October 2006, The Griot Poet
They are the sons and daughters of the Aztecs,
And they went from Vicente Fox-in-the-henhouse to another louse named Calderon
Like: going back-and-forth from John Gotti to Al Capone means anything?
They work for 50 pesos a day.
At the current exchange rate, that's less than 5 bucks, or a little less than $100 American dollars a month.
Which really sucks when the poor – our servants –hollered at the ballet box, outnumbering the elite more than 10-to-1 clamoring for change waiting in the hot Mexican sun.
They got more of the same: different person, same party and no change to their small change of 50 pesos a day.
Their compensation: $100 American bucks, which effectively doubles their meager wages as bellhops, waiters and pages for hustling after tips, which coincides with the going rate for UPSCALE lower class living arrangements!
The same game is played in the states, as the stakes are NAFTA, CAFTA & FREE TRADE for the Americas: the political elite only change horses midstream to make you and I think we have a choice in this horserace.
As our high-tech jobs fly overseas at breakneck pace, the fastest growing employment is in the service industries: Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Target, grocery and department stores, waiters, maids and butlers.
Things that make you go: "hm!"
The only recompense is political independence from a two-party system more skilled in playing our political heartstrings than solving real problems beyond the Washington beltway!
The only recompense is political independence before we have a country we all deplore:
Waking up to a "Brave New World" of Code Orange threats and getting by on
50 pesos a day!
They are the sons and daughters of the Aztecs,
And they went from Vicente Fox-in-the-henhouse to another louse named Calderon
Like: going back-and-forth from John Gotti to Al Capone means anything?
They work for 50 pesos a day.
At the current exchange rate, that's less than 5 bucks, or a little less than $100 American dollars a month.
Which really sucks when the poor – our servants –hollered at the ballet box, outnumbering the elite more than 10-to-1 clamoring for change waiting in the hot Mexican sun.
They got more of the same: different person, same party and no change to their small change of 50 pesos a day.
Their compensation: $100 American bucks, which effectively doubles their meager wages as bellhops, waiters and pages for hustling after tips, which coincides with the going rate for UPSCALE lower class living arrangements!
The same game is played in the states, as the stakes are NAFTA, CAFTA & FREE TRADE for the Americas: the political elite only change horses midstream to make you and I think we have a choice in this horserace.
As our high-tech jobs fly overseas at breakneck pace, the fastest growing employment is in the service industries: Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Target, grocery and department stores, waiters, maids and butlers.
Things that make you go: "hm!"
The only recompense is political independence from a two-party system more skilled in playing our political heartstrings than solving real problems beyond the Washington beltway!
The only recompense is political independence before we have a country we all deplore:
Waking up to a "Brave New World" of Code Orange threats and getting by on
50 pesos a day!
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
Blogging for Change
(c) 6 November 2006 (on the eve of the election)
"This election is too close to call...
"This election is too close NOT to call!"
We've stalled the constitution,
Habeas Corpus needs a reunion
With laws of governance
That at a glance
Were thrown out on a whim of chance!
Don't be a "football fan" electorate,
Whether you have a Casey Sheehan,
2,800 + of men and women died for us
(655,000 Iraqi cousins of the human family as well)
For pundits who during Vietnam had
"Other priorities" and protected Texas
Skies scoring in the LOWEST percentile
Of pilot candidates, and now advises us
As a previous member of the Texas
"Champaigne Unit"
With NO previous combat experience
"To stay the course!"
I am blogging for change,
On the eve of this election game
I have voted for the opposition
Two weeks before this rendition
Of the democratic experiment:
"A government of laws; not men."
I am NOT voting for the Democrats
As the panacea to this morass:
It was 1994 when this mafioso
Staged the "Contract ON America"
From the Democrat's previous sins.
I'm sure K street is ready to switch it's focus again!
And Tom Delay's mission
To re-RE-district
After the 2000 Census
To ensure a permanent, Republican
Majority in Texas
And the US.
I am blogging for change.
For people who got shot, hosed, beaten
For me NOT to vote,
Would be a sin...
"Fool me once, shame on... shame on... shame on...
"You can't get fooled again!"
Sunday, July 30, 2006
The Exception
© 30 July 2006, The Griot Poet
“Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”
And that is section one of the 13th Amendment!
And: the zenith of your life’s achievement is to be “jumped in” to a gang of criminality, joining illegal fraternities’ labeled ostensibly:
- Crips,
- Bloods,
- Latin Kings,
- Asian Tongs,
- Black Gansta Disciples,
- MS13…
And: you THINK because PHAT Farm ®, FUBU ® and JC Penny ® made your fashion an American icon, you have position, power and importance?
Brother, PLEASE!
Never
Ignorant
Getting
Goals
Accomplished
Is a clever acrostic metaphor of a racial epithet popularized by TUPAC (whose heart by the way is still stopped).
Biggie followed him, both of them dying at the statistical life block of 25 after actuaries lower your insurance and you start accumulating wealth, position, political power and importance.
Dead presidents reach beyond the grave, but dead men can’t father boys that become thug knaves: perpetuating generational curses in myriad bloodlines mass-producing docile knaves:
- Crips,
- Bloods,
- Latin Kings,
- Asian Tongs,
- Black Gansta Disciples,
- MS13…
“Keeping it real”: with the new titles for corporate American Fascist slaves!
“Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”
And that is section one of the 13th Amendment!
And: the zenith of your life’s achievement is to be “jumped in” to a gang of criminality, joining illegal fraternities’ labeled ostensibly:
- Crips,
- Bloods,
- Latin Kings,
- Asian Tongs,
- Black Gansta Disciples,
- MS13…
And: you THINK because PHAT Farm ®, FUBU ® and JC Penny ® made your fashion an American icon, you have position, power and importance?
Brother, PLEASE!
Never
Ignorant
Getting
Goals
Accomplished
Is a clever acrostic metaphor of a racial epithet popularized by TUPAC (whose heart by the way is still stopped).
Biggie followed him, both of them dying at the statistical life block of 25 after actuaries lower your insurance and you start accumulating wealth, position, political power and importance.
Dead presidents reach beyond the grave, but dead men can’t father boys that become thug knaves: perpetuating generational curses in myriad bloodlines mass-producing docile knaves:
- Crips,
- Bloods,
- Latin Kings,
- Asian Tongs,
- Black Gansta Disciples,
- MS13…
“Keeping it real”: with the new titles for corporate American Fascist slaves!
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Tribute to Dr. Ronald E. McNair (circa 1986)
Thanks to Dr. Sandin (Ron and my General Physics professor at North Carolina A & T State University), this was found among his many papers in semi-retirement. The letter and poem are 20.5 years old. I record this to not misplace it again...
*****
My Dear Friends,
Since my commission, I have traveled many miles, seen many places. I have laughed, loved, enjoying life as an alumnus. My casual wear-about-town has slowly developed into my Aggie class ring, any Aggie Shirt, and my Aggie cap. I also spend my Aggie time trying to explain to the average Texan that I am not from Texas A & M!
I wish that these times were not so sad. As you cried, I cried too. My sadness was magnified as I thought of you, all of you. When the tears no longer flowed, I realized this was not the way to remember our friend.
I’ll remember my first glimpse of Ron McNair as not in person. I was fourteen, reading an A & T alumni newspaper. Trying to decide what I wanted to do with my life. Reading the article inspired me. The fall of 1980 found me on the campus of my hero: quiet, bright, undisciplined. The path I had chosen was wrought with traps of failure. And I did fail, but I would not quit, because he would not.
I’ll remember the first time I met him. He was hailed our conquering hero, our knight in shining armor. I was involved in the festivities until days end. By this time, Ron had graduated from my idol to my friend.
I had hoped to see him again in Houston, Texas since I lived right next door in Austin. Now, that hope is gone but, I will not despair. He would not want us to.
I will remember him as a winner in the true sense of the word. His presence was dazzling, yet his attitude humble. He remembered the road many of us are still traveling.
If we can learn anything from this tragedy, let us learn from the example of his life. In all his travels, he knew of his obligation to help others. He knew his light must shine “from Dare to Cherokee” and the four corners of the earth. He never forgot about his second home, A & T, and never let any opportunity slip by to tell someone what a special place it was. This home is Ron McNair’s heart. If this is so, he will live forever.
My love to you all,
An Epitaph for my Hero
© 1986, Reginald L. Goodwin
He would come from humble beginnings,
A young brother with great dreams,
And a strong will determining
His own tomorrow; It seems
A&T has produced leaders, some
Giants in their fields,
With humble knowledge of whence they’d come,
Always befriending others in need,
McNair too on the ‘Aggie Struggle’
In pursuit of his degree,
Then onward to dare, challenge and trouble
MIT for his PhD
He was our hero, this Aggie gladiator
Yet: on this note we all must think,
Each person has a pre-scored
Date with destiny we must keep.
As phoenix met its fiery end,
So too will he rise again,
And on that day of happiness we will then
Meet and greet a long lost friend.
Think not of our great loss,
But of history’s gain.
Let us remember him by paying the costs
He did to rise to fame.
An Aggie is best remembered
Not just in the tears we shed,
But in emulation and earnest meditation
Of the inspiring life he led.
We can only pray our loss
Is to God’s saving grace,
And know that Ron still thinks of us
(As we him), out there… exploring space.
Monday, June 12, 2006
At What Cost?
© 12 June 2006, The Griot Poet
When we integrated: our high schools became middle schools; our middle schools elementary, our colleges secondary.
The teachers who cared for us as 2nd mothers and fathers systematically retired, placed on medical or disciplinary leave or fired!
Suburban districts of white flight could not find suitable teacher candidates of color to hire (therefore, fewer black principals in their municipality).
“Soccer moms”: soccer, a slang term from England for “football association.” Women preening like peacocks with children in parks, a hybrid between the regal bird, Jewish American Princesses and WASPs as their men in the height of nepotism gave themselves the top salaries, rapid promotions, spiffs, bonuses, accelerators and stock options while they kicked us and our collective assets to the curb!
The WASPs further stung us numb as we lapsed into the somnambulism of sitcom unrealism: Cliff and Claire Huxtable set us up to have under performing children indulged by the wealth of overextended lifestyles and paycheck-to-paycheck slavery.
Someone has to stay home with the babies before pharmaceutical companies addict them to reconstituted forms of cocaine, lowered life goals, self-esteem and expectations.
When we integrated: we set up idols of wood, stone and cul-de-sacs in “master”-planned communities,
- In “master”-planned communities,
- In “MASTER”-planned communities,
Achieving the right to get in debt, get on the high speed Internet and shop in the same malls, our creature comforts stalled our spiritual progress.
Our secular god, knowledge was replaced by “Pimp My Ride ©” and “bling - bling.” Asians and Anglos study hours to capture global industries versus the 1 in 16,000 chance of landing a spot as a pro athlete!
Our churches, synagogues and mosques became overpopulated with women holding out hope to find a leader-protector-lover: only to find the conversation after preaching no different than the previous night’s venture at the club/meat market.
So, our women began “shaking their assets” in gangster lean hip hop video fantasies, female capitalists passed around from bed-to-bed by masters of staccato poetry: just like their mothers had been previously in choir robes by revered pastors.
No roots to Public Enemy or KRS-1, the corporate formula for hip POP from Cornel West = highly sexed, violent and ignorant.
A successful CONINTELPRO operation: the black messiahs Medgar, Malcolm and Martin assassinated,
When we integrated: we went from strong aromatic roast to watered-down coffee, highly creamed, over-sugared to be the “acceptable taste.”
Form without substance; talent at a waste.
Not realizing in our buffoonery
We are weak!
When we integrated: our high schools became middle schools; our middle schools elementary, our colleges secondary.
The teachers who cared for us as 2nd mothers and fathers systematically retired, placed on medical or disciplinary leave or fired!
Suburban districts of white flight could not find suitable teacher candidates of color to hire (therefore, fewer black principals in their municipality).
“Soccer moms”: soccer, a slang term from England for “football association.” Women preening like peacocks with children in parks, a hybrid between the regal bird, Jewish American Princesses and WASPs as their men in the height of nepotism gave themselves the top salaries, rapid promotions, spiffs, bonuses, accelerators and stock options while they kicked us and our collective assets to the curb!
The WASPs further stung us numb as we lapsed into the somnambulism of sitcom unrealism: Cliff and Claire Huxtable set us up to have under performing children indulged by the wealth of overextended lifestyles and paycheck-to-paycheck slavery.
Someone has to stay home with the babies before pharmaceutical companies addict them to reconstituted forms of cocaine, lowered life goals, self-esteem and expectations.
When we integrated: we set up idols of wood, stone and cul-de-sacs in “master”-planned communities,
- In “master”-planned communities,
- In “MASTER”-planned communities,
Achieving the right to get in debt, get on the high speed Internet and shop in the same malls, our creature comforts stalled our spiritual progress.
Our secular god, knowledge was replaced by “Pimp My Ride ©” and “bling - bling.” Asians and Anglos study hours to capture global industries versus the 1 in 16,000 chance of landing a spot as a pro athlete!
Our churches, synagogues and mosques became overpopulated with women holding out hope to find a leader-protector-lover: only to find the conversation after preaching no different than the previous night’s venture at the club/meat market.
So, our women began “shaking their assets” in gangster lean hip hop video fantasies, female capitalists passed around from bed-to-bed by masters of staccato poetry: just like their mothers had been previously in choir robes by revered pastors.
No roots to Public Enemy or KRS-1, the corporate formula for hip POP from Cornel West = highly sexed, violent and ignorant.
A successful CONINTELPRO operation: the black messiahs Medgar, Malcolm and Martin assassinated,
When we integrated: we went from strong aromatic roast to watered-down coffee, highly creamed, over-sugared to be the “acceptable taste.”
Form without substance; talent at a waste.
Not realizing in our buffoonery
We are weak!
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Bodhisattva
© 26 May 2006, The Griot Poet
A true martial art
explores the limitations
of one's ignorance.
A true martial art
explores the limitations
of one's ignorance.
Sunday, May 07, 2006
The Invasion of Forrest Gump
© 21 April 2006, The Griot Poet
"Today there is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence. It is either nonviolence or nonexistence." Martin Luther King, Jr.
We have been invaded by “Looney Tunes,”
The freaking CRAZIES have entered the room
President Duck Dodgers-in-chief
Has a decades missed date with reality to keep.
He “hears the voices”… but of who?
It’s from the “cuckoo’s nest” where that comment flew!
One more Long Island Iced Tea than he should have bothered.
He says he answers to a higher Father,
I have no qualms or bother with his religious beliefs
Except it shouldn’t be the basis for global policy and domestic relief
(Especially in New Orleans!)
His VEEP, Sir Elmer Fuddle the first did one more draft deferment than needed.
Had he heeded the call of his country,
His quail/fish-in-a-barrel shooting skills might-have-been a little less shabby!
He is a pacemaker glitch from the “big one!”
Slurring his speech like he’s in the first throws of a stroke,
Yet, he’s the privileged son we have in a secret bunker
To keep order in case Duck Dodgers goes AWOL again?
Dodger’s approval rating is one degree just above freezing,
Congress is THREE below that
Elmer’s TWELVE below them… Shh! Be very, very quiet!
In this morass, we’re hunting common sense.
It is to the chagrin of sense
That we are in this present mess
Fed by co-religionist rapture theories
Listen: no parent gives absolutes to any punishment,
So why do you box God into the role of warrior-tormenter for the last judgment?
And when did He attach a nuke to his promise to come back?
Refresher: During the Cold War, M.A.D. stood for Mutually Assured Destruction,
And Carl Sagan computerized and prophesied a “nuclear winter.”
Since Yeshua Himself said “no man knows the time or the hour”
How do you have the power to see that tactical nukes are the key to our salvation?
The only oblation that makes sense
Is that you are “the man of sin”; “the son of perdition” the “6-6-6”
Along with your 3-6 Mafia cabinet of Vulcan fools…
Fixing elections as a matter of rule.
Decrying gay marriage, Terry Shiavo, and “family values”
While families suffer from your brazen rule.
Your brain Karl Rove is a college flunkout,
Yet, he advises you on how to appeal to baser views
On hot-button issues designed to motivate the electorate to move
On things that will not prosperity net them,
Yet in the end, pay off your rich friends.
The one prophesy I’ll leave you with for what it’s worth:
“The meek, not the rich, will inherit the earth!”
"Today there is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence. It is either nonviolence or nonexistence." Martin Luther King, Jr.
We have been invaded by “Looney Tunes,”
The freaking CRAZIES have entered the room
President Duck Dodgers-in-chief
Has a decades missed date with reality to keep.
He “hears the voices”… but of who?
It’s from the “cuckoo’s nest” where that comment flew!
One more Long Island Iced Tea than he should have bothered.
He says he answers to a higher Father,
I have no qualms or bother with his religious beliefs
Except it shouldn’t be the basis for global policy and domestic relief
(Especially in New Orleans!)
His VEEP, Sir Elmer Fuddle the first did one more draft deferment than needed.
Had he heeded the call of his country,
His quail/fish-in-a-barrel shooting skills might-have-been a little less shabby!
He is a pacemaker glitch from the “big one!”
Slurring his speech like he’s in the first throws of a stroke,
Yet, he’s the privileged son we have in a secret bunker
To keep order in case Duck Dodgers goes AWOL again?
Dodger’s approval rating is one degree just above freezing,
Congress is THREE below that
Elmer’s TWELVE below them… Shh! Be very, very quiet!
In this morass, we’re hunting common sense.
It is to the chagrin of sense
That we are in this present mess
Fed by co-religionist rapture theories
Listen: no parent gives absolutes to any punishment,
So why do you box God into the role of warrior-tormenter for the last judgment?
And when did He attach a nuke to his promise to come back?
Refresher: During the Cold War, M.A.D. stood for Mutually Assured Destruction,
And Carl Sagan computerized and prophesied a “nuclear winter.”
Since Yeshua Himself said “no man knows the time or the hour”
How do you have the power to see that tactical nukes are the key to our salvation?
The only oblation that makes sense
Is that you are “the man of sin”; “the son of perdition” the “6-6-6”
Along with your 3-6 Mafia cabinet of Vulcan fools…
Fixing elections as a matter of rule.
Decrying gay marriage, Terry Shiavo, and “family values”
While families suffer from your brazen rule.
Your brain Karl Rove is a college flunkout,
Yet, he advises you on how to appeal to baser views
On hot-button issues designed to motivate the electorate to move
On things that will not prosperity net them,
Yet in the end, pay off your rich friends.
The one prophesy I’ll leave you with for what it’s worth:
“The meek, not the rich, will inherit the earth!”
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
A Prayer For Australia
© 20 March 2006, The Griot Poet
Sent to Thom the World Poet (an Aussie Poet and Friend in Austin, Texas)
My prayers to your countrymen…
The chagrin of “ignorance is strength”
Is the proper Orwellian quote,
Not the “bliss” misquoted and we note that
Global warming like evolution is not a "theory"
That can be ignored due to it not playing well politically
With “the base,”
Which is the literal translation of the phrase “Al-Qaeda."
Shall we then devolve to Neanderthals
For the prediction that Einstein made
(though not one for prophecy)
Was chilling in any age:
"I do not know what weapons they'll use in the Third World War.
"But it is assured in the fourth; they will be sticks and stones."
Shall we deplore factual gathering as moribund
as tsunamis, earthquakes and cyclones wreck biblical havoc
On Asia, New Orleans and now Australia?
On shores we could protect
were we not connected to political bloodsuckers
more intent on winning than dominion; on domination than governing?
Sent to Thom the World Poet (an Aussie Poet and Friend in Austin, Texas)
My prayers to your countrymen…
The chagrin of “ignorance is strength”
Is the proper Orwellian quote,
Not the “bliss” misquoted and we note that
Global warming like evolution is not a "theory"
That can be ignored due to it not playing well politically
With “the base,”
Which is the literal translation of the phrase “Al-Qaeda."
Shall we then devolve to Neanderthals
For the prediction that Einstein made
(though not one for prophecy)
Was chilling in any age:
"I do not know what weapons they'll use in the Third World War.
"But it is assured in the fourth; they will be sticks and stones."
Shall we deplore factual gathering as moribund
as tsunamis, earthquakes and cyclones wreck biblical havoc
On Asia, New Orleans and now Australia?
On shores we could protect
were we not connected to political bloodsuckers
more intent on winning than dominion; on domination than governing?
Tuesday, March 07, 2006
On The Cusp of Things...
© 7 March 2006, The Griot Poet
I am forty-three.
Admittedly, I am supposed to be at the apogee of my career.
I once was.
Because of the “good” of the global economy,
My job was downsized, outsourced without apology
(Or lubricant) for the entrance of my cubicle
And the exit of my own self assurance
That I could provide for my family.
I have not the perspective that politicians see on official visits across the sea to India that this is a good thing! This is not Martin’s “let freedom ring.”
I wrote a blog called “Outsourced American”
As spiritual breadcrumbs
I refuse to be dumb
About the pain I’ve gone through
The changes I’ve endured
It’s a wonder my family is together, whole...
If I’d taken a poll six months ago
I wouldn’t make a fair bet that
I’d yet be typing these words…
Corpses don’t do diction well.
Though these thoughts are dark,
No one contemplates
Heaven or hell
When the very meaning of one’s existence
Falls into question...
I have had
Crash learning sessions
With ecliptics and reflector telescopes
Labs and homework
Working with people almost half my age
At the stage of their life where things are just beginning...
I remember well!
I remember when my time had ended
At my undergraduate matriculation
Volunteered service to the Air Force
That started the first seeds of strife...
Forced to leave for a lie, I had to recreate another life
As a semiconductor process engineer
For reference, see the first stanza
Of this piece, first line beginning: “I am forty-three.”
A midterm approaches
As I appeal to the UNKNOWN God
Of Paul (and me)
That created all
To recreate in me a mind that recalls
Everything on Black Holes and Binary Stars
Because it is through favor that I am even here at all…
Failure is not an option
Because I have fewer decades ahead of me
And more behind
The only motive that spurs:
Cadet Colonel Wall of Army JROTC stating to me
“Your kind will NEVER rise to this rank.”
I’ve had this shank stabbed in my chest before
And when I was younger I endured
And fought hard
To let the enemy know I deplore his tactics
That he’s a PUNK;
A chump!
And just like you didn’t stop me then
You WON’T stop me now!
However: I am forty-three.
I am further from my birth and closer to forever.
Even though I tire of the assault: face bloody, wind sucking, knees buckling; boxed ears ring; I will not be defeated.
I feel... I am on the cusp of things!
I am forty-three.
Admittedly, I am supposed to be at the apogee of my career.
I once was.
Because of the “good” of the global economy,
My job was downsized, outsourced without apology
(Or lubricant) for the entrance of my cubicle
And the exit of my own self assurance
That I could provide for my family.
I have not the perspective that politicians see on official visits across the sea to India that this is a good thing! This is not Martin’s “let freedom ring.”
I wrote a blog called “Outsourced American”
As spiritual breadcrumbs
I refuse to be dumb
About the pain I’ve gone through
The changes I’ve endured
It’s a wonder my family is together, whole...
If I’d taken a poll six months ago
I wouldn’t make a fair bet that
I’d yet be typing these words…
Corpses don’t do diction well.
Though these thoughts are dark,
No one contemplates
Heaven or hell
When the very meaning of one’s existence
Falls into question...
I have had
Crash learning sessions
With ecliptics and reflector telescopes
Labs and homework
Working with people almost half my age
At the stage of their life where things are just beginning...
I remember well!
I remember when my time had ended
At my undergraduate matriculation
Volunteered service to the Air Force
That started the first seeds of strife...
Forced to leave for a lie, I had to recreate another life
As a semiconductor process engineer
For reference, see the first stanza
Of this piece, first line beginning: “I am forty-three.”
A midterm approaches
As I appeal to the UNKNOWN God
Of Paul (and me)
That created all
To recreate in me a mind that recalls
Everything on Black Holes and Binary Stars
Because it is through favor that I am even here at all…
Failure is not an option
Because I have fewer decades ahead of me
And more behind
The only motive that spurs:
Cadet Colonel Wall of Army JROTC stating to me
“Your kind will NEVER rise to this rank.”
I’ve had this shank stabbed in my chest before
And when I was younger I endured
And fought hard
To let the enemy know I deplore his tactics
That he’s a PUNK;
A chump!
And just like you didn’t stop me then
You WON’T stop me now!
However: I am forty-three.
I am further from my birth and closer to forever.
Even though I tire of the assault: face bloody, wind sucking, knees buckling; boxed ears ring; I will not be defeated.
I feel... I am on the cusp of things!
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
Sovereignty
© 27 February 2006, The Griot Poet
To answer without answering:
The definition of the word is… itself.
George Orwell would be so proud!
Though Webster seems locked away
On his dimwitted, Ivy League shelf
I can hear the faint sound of snickers
From the once moribund press corps
On his ironic struggle
To describe
What Native American tribes
DO NOT have
Because of his elite ancestry and their
Robber Barron thievery many scores before:
“Sovereignty: Supreme power, especially
Over a body politic;
“Freedom from external control: the right to self-govern: autonomy!”
To answer without answering:
The definition of the word is… itself.
George Orwell would be so proud!
Though Webster seems locked away
On his dimwitted, Ivy League shelf
I can hear the faint sound of snickers
From the once moribund press corps
On his ironic struggle
To describe
What Native American tribes
DO NOT have
Because of his elite ancestry and their
Robber Barron thievery many scores before:
“Sovereignty: Supreme power, especially
Over a body politic;
“Freedom from external control: the right to self-govern: autonomy!”
Sunday, February 12, 2006
A Prayer For Amy
© 11 February 2006, The Griot Poet
Amy Green Dickerson
Sunrise: 7 February 1915. Sunset: 3 February 2006
Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His Saints, Psalms 116:15
We laud those assembled here
For the home going of our precious Mother Dear.
Many a summer we can remember
Visiting before the rigor of school in September
How HAPPY she’d be to see us…
That lasted about a day!
After that welcome,
She’d task a detailed list of chores for us
Keeping us too busy for Satan’s mischief,
Making us render due reverence at each meal served.
We read the Bible; studied the Word, learned from her example how to pray.
Though diminutive in stature, she was a WARRIOR on her knees:
Supplexing principalities and pimp-slapping demons
Petitioning God-Almighty for the life of her assaulted husband Horace,
A noble soldier in the Civil Rights struggle
And each blessed one of her children’s, children’s children.
Mother Dear imparted “her mind, her will, her imagination, her emotions and her intellect” to you
It is this soul-glue that holds this family together
To weather the storms of wars;
Economic downturns and political struggle…
“What hath God wrought,” Samuel Morse, from this man of God and this matriarch?
All those chores she had you do,
And the beatings she’d administer with the switch you’d pursue
Imparted her character: “never quit, never give up”
To each one of you…
She breathed out her spirit long before this assemblage.
The tears we cry of her spirit’s departure, but not as those without hope!
We will se her again in that great day of freedom, “true North”
In the air with the LORD
And beyond the fear of violence, death or rope
“Jesus wept.”
And afterward, raised Lazarus like He will Mother Dear and each one of us.
Have HOPE and not distress!
Heaven has gained three noteworthy angels:
Rosa Parks;
Corretta Scott King;
And Amy Green Dickerson…
And “Pa-Pa” is reunited with his princess!
Amy Green Dickerson
Sunrise: 7 February 1915. Sunset: 3 February 2006
Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His Saints, Psalms 116:15
We laud those assembled here
For the home going of our precious Mother Dear.
Many a summer we can remember
Visiting before the rigor of school in September
How HAPPY she’d be to see us…
That lasted about a day!
After that welcome,
She’d task a detailed list of chores for us
Keeping us too busy for Satan’s mischief,
Making us render due reverence at each meal served.
We read the Bible; studied the Word, learned from her example how to pray.
Though diminutive in stature, she was a WARRIOR on her knees:
Supplexing principalities and pimp-slapping demons
Petitioning God-Almighty for the life of her assaulted husband Horace,
A noble soldier in the Civil Rights struggle
And each blessed one of her children’s, children’s children.
Mother Dear imparted “her mind, her will, her imagination, her emotions and her intellect” to you
It is this soul-glue that holds this family together
To weather the storms of wars;
Economic downturns and political struggle…
“What hath God wrought,” Samuel Morse, from this man of God and this matriarch?
All those chores she had you do,
And the beatings she’d administer with the switch you’d pursue
Imparted her character: “never quit, never give up”
To each one of you…
She breathed out her spirit long before this assemblage.
The tears we cry of her spirit’s departure, but not as those without hope!
We will se her again in that great day of freedom, “true North”
In the air with the LORD
And beyond the fear of violence, death or rope
“Jesus wept.”
And afterward, raised Lazarus like He will Mother Dear and each one of us.
Have HOPE and not distress!
Heaven has gained three noteworthy angels:
Rosa Parks;
Corretta Scott King;
And Amy Green Dickerson…
And “Pa-Pa” is reunited with his princess!
Future Venues
© 12 February 2006, The Griot Poet
Inspired by an e-mail from Thom the World Poet and the article “Crossing the Rubicon” by John Pilger on truthout.org
Prepare to sing sonnets in foxholes
And haiku in bunkers
As the only theology will be the pleas
Of human beings to thunder deities
Reigning down "shock and awe"
With "rods of god"
And weapons of massive destruction
For an addiction not just to oil which withers and sours,
But to broad, maniacal unadulterated power!
"Better to rule in hell than to serve in heaven,"
John Milton knew us so well,
And we will soon have dominion over a cinder of what's left of earth:
Home of our birth
As ideologies replace ideas and scientific curiosity,
As scientific experts on global warming are silenced by
Politically appointed "hack-artists" lacking the graduation
Credentials from Texas A&M: he worked on the campaign;
He is our friend, is the only acid test of rampant cronyism
That spread from Texas to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Prophets Of Eternal Truths: sing loud at venues,
Like Pablo Neruda, we do not have time for "lilacs and
Poppy-petalled metaphysics."
We speak to megalomaniacs in ivory-glassed towers of babbling fools
Determined without consideration of consequence
Mjolnir's clap of nuclear lightning and sonic thunder:
Or, prepare to sing sonnets in foxholes
And haiku in bunkers!
Inspired by an e-mail from Thom the World Poet and the article “Crossing the Rubicon” by John Pilger on truthout.org
Prepare to sing sonnets in foxholes
And haiku in bunkers
As the only theology will be the pleas
Of human beings to thunder deities
Reigning down "shock and awe"
With "rods of god"
And weapons of massive destruction
For an addiction not just to oil which withers and sours,
But to broad, maniacal unadulterated power!
"Better to rule in hell than to serve in heaven,"
John Milton knew us so well,
And we will soon have dominion over a cinder of what's left of earth:
Home of our birth
As ideologies replace ideas and scientific curiosity,
As scientific experts on global warming are silenced by
Politically appointed "hack-artists" lacking the graduation
Credentials from Texas A&M: he worked on the campaign;
He is our friend, is the only acid test of rampant cronyism
That spread from Texas to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Prophets Of Eternal Truths: sing loud at venues,
Like Pablo Neruda, we do not have time for "lilacs and
Poppy-petalled metaphysics."
We speak to megalomaniacs in ivory-glassed towers of babbling fools
Determined without consideration of consequence
Mjolnir's clap of nuclear lightning and sonic thunder:
Or, prepare to sing sonnets in foxholes
And haiku in bunkers!
Sunday, February 05, 2006
Promotion to a New Conservatory
© 5 February 2006, The Griot Poet
1 Corinthians 13:13 "And now abide Faith, Hope, Love, These Three; but the greatest of these is Love."
Nary a word spoken on their first date
When a young philosophy major stated: "The four things that I look for in a wife are character, personality, intelligence and beauty. And you have them all."
She would fall under his spell a year later.
They would marry, have children, preach sermons, organize and participate in marches; dodge rocks, bullets, bombs, and CONINTELPRO pre-FISA electronic surveillance and death threats.
Yet, when she became a single mother and a famous widow, she picked up his mantle without hesitation.
It would be her purview to carry on his message of Civil Rights, Human Rights, Poverty Rights for workers in Memphis before her husband was buried, and like him: the sum total of her living was not the accumulation of things.
Yet, she fought hard to get the Martin Luther King Center for Non-Violent Social Change built. Despite seen by many as aloof, competing for monies from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and more concerned with Martin’s legacy than his struggle.
Character
Before Bill embarrassed Hillary, she had to drink the bitter swill of his confession of infidelity. Even though he tried to justify it by saying “she reminded me of you,” the anger was probably hot and the suspicions of his not liking her on the trail coalesced on infidelity, not about her or the children’s safety. Yet, she stayed, through adultery, bombs and death threats…
Personality
Coretta had her own dreams and her own mind before the Morehouse fellow nicknamed “Tweed” turned on the charm. She caused quite an alarm to both Martins, father and son when she demanded the word “obey” from her wedding vows stricken: she was her OWN woman. She got her wish…
Intelligence
Coretta Scott was born April 27, 1927, the middle of three children born to Obadiah and Bernice Scott. She grew up poor, picking cotton in the hot fields of the segregated South, watching buses full of white kids pass to “separate but equal” schools or doing housework.
Coretta graduated first in her high school class of 17 in 1945. She thrived at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio.
She studied education and music. Coretta Scott competed for and gained access to the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. Not an easy feat even today! Her goal: to become a classical singer. She worked as a mail order clerk and cleaned houses to augment the fellowship that barely paid her tuition. Sister was on a mission…
Beauty
“Tweed” smoothly uttered the words: “You know every Napoleon has his Waterloo. I'm like Napoleon. I'm at my Waterloo, and I'm on my knees.”
She replied the elegant equivalent of “Negro, please!” “That’s absurd, you don’t even know me.”
Disappointed that he was shorter than she, he made up for this by his erudition and confidence. She made him wait six months after proposing before she said “yes.” At 350 guests, the wedding was the largest Atlanta had seen – then or since.
And who didn’t wish to be the cheek she kissed when he’d be freeze-framed for magazines like Ebony, Life, Time and Jet?
“Behind every great man” is so cliché. But without Coretta, would there be a Martin we laud today? Without Eve, would we remember Adam, who cowardly abdicated his responsibly in Africa/Eden, saying, “it was this woman you gave me?”
It is fitting she is the first person of African descent, male or female, to lie in state in the Georgia capital, after Brown proudly flying the “stars and bars.”
Though we wept, the vehicle that once housed her spirit and soul reflected the beauty that once dwelled within.
And Martin now has his final Waterloo in Heaven’s blue: reunited forever with his queen.
1 Corinthians 13:13 "And now abide Faith, Hope, Love, These Three; but the greatest of these is Love."
Nary a word spoken on their first date
When a young philosophy major stated: "The four things that I look for in a wife are character, personality, intelligence and beauty. And you have them all."
She would fall under his spell a year later.
They would marry, have children, preach sermons, organize and participate in marches; dodge rocks, bullets, bombs, and CONINTELPRO pre-FISA electronic surveillance and death threats.
Yet, when she became a single mother and a famous widow, she picked up his mantle without hesitation.
It would be her purview to carry on his message of Civil Rights, Human Rights, Poverty Rights for workers in Memphis before her husband was buried, and like him: the sum total of her living was not the accumulation of things.
Yet, she fought hard to get the Martin Luther King Center for Non-Violent Social Change built. Despite seen by many as aloof, competing for monies from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and more concerned with Martin’s legacy than his struggle.
Character
Before Bill embarrassed Hillary, she had to drink the bitter swill of his confession of infidelity. Even though he tried to justify it by saying “she reminded me of you,” the anger was probably hot and the suspicions of his not liking her on the trail coalesced on infidelity, not about her or the children’s safety. Yet, she stayed, through adultery, bombs and death threats…
Personality
Coretta had her own dreams and her own mind before the Morehouse fellow nicknamed “Tweed” turned on the charm. She caused quite an alarm to both Martins, father and son when she demanded the word “obey” from her wedding vows stricken: she was her OWN woman. She got her wish…
Intelligence
Coretta Scott was born April 27, 1927, the middle of three children born to Obadiah and Bernice Scott. She grew up poor, picking cotton in the hot fields of the segregated South, watching buses full of white kids pass to “separate but equal” schools or doing housework.
Coretta graduated first in her high school class of 17 in 1945. She thrived at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio.
She studied education and music. Coretta Scott competed for and gained access to the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. Not an easy feat even today! Her goal: to become a classical singer. She worked as a mail order clerk and cleaned houses to augment the fellowship that barely paid her tuition. Sister was on a mission…
Beauty
“Tweed” smoothly uttered the words: “You know every Napoleon has his Waterloo. I'm like Napoleon. I'm at my Waterloo, and I'm on my knees.”
She replied the elegant equivalent of “Negro, please!” “That’s absurd, you don’t even know me.”
Disappointed that he was shorter than she, he made up for this by his erudition and confidence. She made him wait six months after proposing before she said “yes.” At 350 guests, the wedding was the largest Atlanta had seen – then or since.
And who didn’t wish to be the cheek she kissed when he’d be freeze-framed for magazines like Ebony, Life, Time and Jet?
“Behind every great man” is so cliché. But without Coretta, would there be a Martin we laud today? Without Eve, would we remember Adam, who cowardly abdicated his responsibly in Africa/Eden, saying, “it was this woman you gave me?”
It is fitting she is the first person of African descent, male or female, to lie in state in the Georgia capital, after Brown proudly flying the “stars and bars.”
Though we wept, the vehicle that once housed her spirit and soul reflected the beauty that once dwelled within.
And Martin now has his final Waterloo in Heaven’s blue: reunited forever with his queen.
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
Imperious Unum
© 15 January 2006, The Griot Poet
''The signing statement is saying 'I will only comply with this law when I want to, and if something arises in the war on terrorism where I think it's important to torture or engage in cruel, inhuman, and degrading conduct, I have the authority to do so and nothing in this law is going to stop me,' " he said. ''They don't want to come out and say it directly because it doesn't sound very nice, but it's unmistakable to anyone who has been following what's going on." David Golove, a New York University law professor who specializes in executive power issues, “Bush could bypass new torture ban Waiver right is reserved,” by Charlie Savage, Boston Globe Staff | January 4, 2006
1. You shall have no other gods before me.
Skull and Bones does not fall in this category. It is a Germanic, fraternal order, not a secret society, but a society with secrets! Besides, I spell Mammon with a little “g.”
2. You shall not make unto you any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
The American eagle is and was the standard of old and new Rome. I’m the president: the KING of this home! It is not hypocritical for me to quote scripture, stating “wonder-working power” and curse out a staffer or middle finger a liberal in the next half hour!
3. You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain.
I’m the president! I don’t go against the grain to say my most eloquent cursing uses liberally YOUR name!
4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Except on strafing runs with Depleted Uranium guns for the wealth and protection of my rich cronies and their spoiled sons.
5. Honor your father and your mother: that your days may be long upon the land, which the LORD your God gives you.
I do indeed. It was Pappy’s connections that skated me from Vietnam into the Houston, Texas champagne squadron, survived two-failed business ventures and bought me two elections! I talk to him and my higher father regularly to run the country and my sobriety.
6. You shall not kill.
3,000 Americans died on 9-11, souls that went to Nirvana and Heaven. And the attack was predicted, and then conveniently discarded by my cabal from the Project for a New American Century. We needed a “new Pearl Harbor” to shake you from your apathy, have sympathy for Bill Krystal’s empire and accept your loss of liberty in the political night’s growing tyranny. Also: A few hundred heroic brothers spent in Afghanistan, 2,000 plus in Iraq for Saddam and weapons of mass destruction (that didn’t exists) and, oh about 30,000… others.
7. You shall not commit adultery.
Those lies are not true. Condi is my advisor. Besides, the dress this time was not blue!
8. You shall not steal.
We will make tax cuts for the upper 1% permanent. It stimulates the economy. What’s this talk of “no quality jobs?” It’s a HUGE job market; just check Wal-Mart, Temp America, Sears and Target!
9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
It was the State of the Union Address. It was 16 words about a Uranium purchase that did not exist. I call that “faulty intelligence.” Besides, those weren’t my neighbors it was Congress! Most of you couldn’t afford the road that passes my ranch. So, get off this Air America, Common Cause, and Counter Punch, Truth Out conspiracy theory stance. You expect the Patriot Act to be some kind of caper: the Constitution just is a Got-Damned piece of paper!
10. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his manservant, or his maidservant, or his ox, or his ass, or any thing that is your neighbor’s.
Again, you seem to be confused. Iraq is as far from the US as I am from you.
And though the land is salted and spoiled, the place is brimming with lovely oil! My bible has Eden in a mythical place. Saddam is Nebuchadnezzar’s descendant? Coincidence! Abraham’s city of Ur in Iraq? Ridiculous! Jesus black? Nonsense! Which is why we let the history museum be ransacked. Too much knowledge is a dangerous thing! That’s why we give you slogans and hopeless crisis’s like: the assault on Christmas, the assault on the sanctity of marriage, “we’ll smoke ‘em out,” “let’s roll!” Reality takes its toll on the controls we want to enforce. Be like ME! I’d never want anyone’s ass except those that are paying for my servitude abundantly. As for Condi: technically, she’s not my neighbor nor is she married!
''The signing statement is saying 'I will only comply with this law when I want to, and if something arises in the war on terrorism where I think it's important to torture or engage in cruel, inhuman, and degrading conduct, I have the authority to do so and nothing in this law is going to stop me,' " he said. ''They don't want to come out and say it directly because it doesn't sound very nice, but it's unmistakable to anyone who has been following what's going on." David Golove, a New York University law professor who specializes in executive power issues, “Bush could bypass new torture ban Waiver right is reserved,” by Charlie Savage, Boston Globe Staff | January 4, 2006
1. You shall have no other gods before me.
Skull and Bones does not fall in this category. It is a Germanic, fraternal order, not a secret society, but a society with secrets! Besides, I spell Mammon with a little “g.”
2. You shall not make unto you any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
The American eagle is and was the standard of old and new Rome. I’m the president: the KING of this home! It is not hypocritical for me to quote scripture, stating “wonder-working power” and curse out a staffer or middle finger a liberal in the next half hour!
3. You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain.
I’m the president! I don’t go against the grain to say my most eloquent cursing uses liberally YOUR name!
4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Except on strafing runs with Depleted Uranium guns for the wealth and protection of my rich cronies and their spoiled sons.
5. Honor your father and your mother: that your days may be long upon the land, which the LORD your God gives you.
I do indeed. It was Pappy’s connections that skated me from Vietnam into the Houston, Texas champagne squadron, survived two-failed business ventures and bought me two elections! I talk to him and my higher father regularly to run the country and my sobriety.
6. You shall not kill.
3,000 Americans died on 9-11, souls that went to Nirvana and Heaven. And the attack was predicted, and then conveniently discarded by my cabal from the Project for a New American Century. We needed a “new Pearl Harbor” to shake you from your apathy, have sympathy for Bill Krystal’s empire and accept your loss of liberty in the political night’s growing tyranny. Also: A few hundred heroic brothers spent in Afghanistan, 2,000 plus in Iraq for Saddam and weapons of mass destruction (that didn’t exists) and, oh about 30,000… others.
7. You shall not commit adultery.
Those lies are not true. Condi is my advisor. Besides, the dress this time was not blue!
8. You shall not steal.
We will make tax cuts for the upper 1% permanent. It stimulates the economy. What’s this talk of “no quality jobs?” It’s a HUGE job market; just check Wal-Mart, Temp America, Sears and Target!
9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
It was the State of the Union Address. It was 16 words about a Uranium purchase that did not exist. I call that “faulty intelligence.” Besides, those weren’t my neighbors it was Congress! Most of you couldn’t afford the road that passes my ranch. So, get off this Air America, Common Cause, and Counter Punch, Truth Out conspiracy theory stance. You expect the Patriot Act to be some kind of caper: the Constitution just is a Got-Damned piece of paper!
10. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his manservant, or his maidservant, or his ox, or his ass, or any thing that is your neighbor’s.
Again, you seem to be confused. Iraq is as far from the US as I am from you.
And though the land is salted and spoiled, the place is brimming with lovely oil! My bible has Eden in a mythical place. Saddam is Nebuchadnezzar’s descendant? Coincidence! Abraham’s city of Ur in Iraq? Ridiculous! Jesus black? Nonsense! Which is why we let the history museum be ransacked. Too much knowledge is a dangerous thing! That’s why we give you slogans and hopeless crisis’s like: the assault on Christmas, the assault on the sanctity of marriage, “we’ll smoke ‘em out,” “let’s roll!” Reality takes its toll on the controls we want to enforce. Be like ME! I’d never want anyone’s ass except those that are paying for my servitude abundantly. As for Condi: technically, she’s not my neighbor nor is she married!
Saturday, December 31, 2005
Annus Horribilis
© 30 December 2005, The Griot Poet
Where to begin…
Tsunami wipes out Asia…
Hurricanes made super by nature and global warming…
“Our economy's on the mend,” the “our” meaning CEOs, CFOs, and the lot of his corporate friends…
Then, came Katrina, Rita, Wilma and a record breaking twenty-seven
And the world watched in horror as
The freest nation in the world
Had a third world visitation
With cameras filming the plethora of misery on its own soil in black communities in New Orleans (and un-filmed elsewhere)…
The boy-king-candidate promised we’d do no nation building,
Yet, that is exactly what we’ve cared doing in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Africa for natural gas and oil…
And now forced to by Gulf coast embarrassment to do after photo ops on American soil.
Foiled by Kanye’s declared salvo that shattered his very cold soul.
His popularity below 50 percent,
His gained political capital well spent
Now, he’s spying on us domestically without FISA court consent,
Protecting us from boogey-men and civil liberties stoking Reichstag fires
Patriot Acts resemble Article 48 of the Weimar constitution abrogating:
-Free expression of opinion
-Freedom of the press
-Right of assembly and association -Right to privacy of postal and electronic communications
-Protection against unlawful searches and seizures
-Individual property rights
-States' right of self-government
Supplementing this, the creation of the Storm Troopers and SS agencies.
Even he quipped, “If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator!”
The phrase “by no other name can men be saved”
Was first printed on Roman coins for the adopted son of Julius,
Named Caesar,
Then the son of Caesar, born Octavius, made himself Augustus: “worthy of reverence and worship”
Both faces graced an empire with the inspired words on both sides: “Divine Caesar and the Son of God.”
Power corrupts,
And absolute power corrupts absolutely
Until the moment transforms the mediocre into the megalomaniac;
Until lack of cerebral thought becomes strongly delusional;
Until he forgets that he’s a recovering alcoholic,
Until he talks of answering to a “higher father”;
Until his walk is that of a strutting peacock between vacations decrying terrorist killers and private golf course drives.
Until we live to see the abomination of desolation walk into the holy of holies and he and his followers follow the course of all Caesars and dictators… self-proclaimed divinity.
If he was a true believer of the Palestinian prophet he says he follows,
Does he hear “blessed are the peacemakers”?
When Yeshua said, “render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s,”
Greater things would His followers’ do
As they defied the empire that crushed every Palestinian, Roman and Jew
And proclaimed Him as the “Son of God” and “King of Kings.”
Such a thing caused men imprisoned, crucified and hacked by the earliest SS.
For me, personally
I am one of the fading middle classes.
Squeezed between the availability of cheap labor within the US by Vicente Fox’s devalued Peso
(Wire transfers go back to their native Mexico)
And cheaper labor still overseas.
Jobs added are low wage, low or no medical benefits and degrading to citizens born here.
Yet, a man that has never had a hungered day in his life or career states “our economy is sound.”
I can see the madness of declaring a recession when there was none to be found.
He literally talked the markets down in 2000: a feat of mass hypnosis, neuro-linguistic programming, crony favors and the blackest of magic’s.
What was depressing was his rich friends that had the most wanted it ALL:
All the wealth,
All the gold,
All the monies,
All without spending in the highest category: wages.
When sages write about this,
I hope it will be on papyrus
And the wealth and resources they tried to hoard is more than well spent,
And the fears of Socialists, Communists, Compassionate Capitalists
Devolve
To a feudal society
Without technology...
That is our destiny
If we do not adhere
To the terrible lessons
Of this horrible year!
Where to begin…
Tsunami wipes out Asia…
Hurricanes made super by nature and global warming…
“Our economy's on the mend,” the “our” meaning CEOs, CFOs, and the lot of his corporate friends…
Then, came Katrina, Rita, Wilma and a record breaking twenty-seven
And the world watched in horror as
The freest nation in the world
Had a third world visitation
With cameras filming the plethora of misery on its own soil in black communities in New Orleans (and un-filmed elsewhere)…
The boy-king-candidate promised we’d do no nation building,
Yet, that is exactly what we’ve cared doing in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Africa for natural gas and oil…
And now forced to by Gulf coast embarrassment to do after photo ops on American soil.
Foiled by Kanye’s declared salvo that shattered his very cold soul.
His popularity below 50 percent,
His gained political capital well spent
Now, he’s spying on us domestically without FISA court consent,
Protecting us from boogey-men and civil liberties stoking Reichstag fires
Patriot Acts resemble Article 48 of the Weimar constitution abrogating:
-Free expression of opinion
-Freedom of the press
-Right of assembly and association -Right to privacy of postal and electronic communications
-Protection against unlawful searches and seizures
-Individual property rights
-States' right of self-government
Supplementing this, the creation of the Storm Troopers and SS agencies.
Even he quipped, “If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator!”
The phrase “by no other name can men be saved”
Was first printed on Roman coins for the adopted son of Julius,
Named Caesar,
Then the son of Caesar, born Octavius, made himself Augustus: “worthy of reverence and worship”
Both faces graced an empire with the inspired words on both sides: “Divine Caesar and the Son of God.”
Power corrupts,
And absolute power corrupts absolutely
Until the moment transforms the mediocre into the megalomaniac;
Until lack of cerebral thought becomes strongly delusional;
Until he forgets that he’s a recovering alcoholic,
Until he talks of answering to a “higher father”;
Until his walk is that of a strutting peacock between vacations decrying terrorist killers and private golf course drives.
Until we live to see the abomination of desolation walk into the holy of holies and he and his followers follow the course of all Caesars and dictators… self-proclaimed divinity.
If he was a true believer of the Palestinian prophet he says he follows,
Does he hear “blessed are the peacemakers”?
When Yeshua said, “render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s,”
Greater things would His followers’ do
As they defied the empire that crushed every Palestinian, Roman and Jew
And proclaimed Him as the “Son of God” and “King of Kings.”
Such a thing caused men imprisoned, crucified and hacked by the earliest SS.
For me, personally
I am one of the fading middle classes.
Squeezed between the availability of cheap labor within the US by Vicente Fox’s devalued Peso
(Wire transfers go back to their native Mexico)
And cheaper labor still overseas.
Jobs added are low wage, low or no medical benefits and degrading to citizens born here.
Yet, a man that has never had a hungered day in his life or career states “our economy is sound.”
I can see the madness of declaring a recession when there was none to be found.
He literally talked the markets down in 2000: a feat of mass hypnosis, neuro-linguistic programming, crony favors and the blackest of magic’s.
What was depressing was his rich friends that had the most wanted it ALL:
All the wealth,
All the gold,
All the monies,
All without spending in the highest category: wages.
When sages write about this,
I hope it will be on papyrus
And the wealth and resources they tried to hoard is more than well spent,
And the fears of Socialists, Communists, Compassionate Capitalists
Devolve
To a feudal society
Without technology...
That is our destiny
If we do not adhere
To the terrible lessons
Of this horrible year!
Sunday, December 18, 2005
For Josephine and Other Queens
 |
| Ean Wood: The Josephine Baker Story |
Josephine Carson Baker was just dancing…
From dancing in the streets to
Prancing in bananas
From the ghetto of East St. Louis to the Ziegfeld Follies
Probably more sensual and revealing than the smut that masks as art
Presented on 24-hour soft-porn cable TV
Or music videos that celebrate our sisters’ posteriors,
She was also a civil rights pioneer, adopting 10 more of the earth’s dear children than Angelina Jolie, her “rainbow tribe”
Yet, I never heard anyone except racists in this new world or the last in English or French
Describe her as a bitch...
Dorothy Dandridge was a star before her time,
Carmen, Porgy and Bess
Got an Oscar nod
When the best job a black person could get was janitor in the theater coming in from the back...
Lena Horne
Was my forlorn father’s pin-up gal in the Navy,
And, even though it’s crazy,
There’s a picture on the Internet of Lena signing autographs among
Naval men of color…
The guy on the far right looks like my father’s twin brother (he didn’t have one)...
Perhaps I am amiss,
But I lament the days of
Old when we treated our women like gold
And would slap on a beat down if anyone of any stripe tried to call them out of their names...
Before video
Ruined music and created visual universes that are programmed by directors penetrating the hymen of our minds...
I remember the time when they were our queens
And how some of them – gone or still alive
Must feel when they see their beautiful daughters
Bump and grind
On a video
For a nickel bag pretend GANGSTA who hasn’t spent ten minutes in the ghetto, and
Whose first reference to them is “bitch” followed by “ho”?
I remember
Before Carter G. Woodson’s “Miss Education of the Negro”
Became the flipped script for MTV rap videos
And we in “Step-and-Fetch” followed this jest in our best-burnt cork face
To its Viacom clone: Bankrupt Entertainment Television
Until hip-hop like opera before it
Went from the streets to the board rooms of American aristocracy and became “hip-POP”
So that Gwen Stephanie can make hits on rhymes that make NO sense!
Skeeting our seed with Little John “to the window; to the wall!”
And pimping all our future mothers like those
Whom we pay for the oldest profession in the world...
I remember
When Josephine, Dorothy, Lena, Dianne Carroll, Lola Falana, Rosa Parks, Corretta Scott King, Betty Shabazz, Lieutenant Uhura (whose name means “freedom”), Ida B. Wells, Sister Soul Ja, your own MOTHER
When we treated our women like precious queens!
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
I'm Explaining a Few Things
This s a poet I can appreciate: I give you Pablo Neruda
You are going to ask: and where are the lilacs?
and the poppy-petalled metaphysics?
and the rain repeatedly spattering
its words and drilling them full
of apertures and birds?
I'll tell you all the news.
I lived in a suburb,
a suburb of Madrid, with bells,
and clocks, and trees.
From there you could look out
over Castille's dry face:
a leather ocean.
My house was called
the house of flowers, because in every cranny
geraniums burst: it was
a good-looking house
with its dogs and children.
Remember, Raul?
Eh, Rafel? Federico, do you remember
from under the ground
my balconies on which
the light of June drowned flowers in your mouth?
Brother, my brother!
Everything
loud with big voices, the salt of merchandises,
pile-ups of palpitating bread,
the stalls of my suburb of Arguelles with its statue
like a drained inkwell in a swirl of hake:
oil flowed into spoons,
a deep baying
of feet and hands swelled in the streets,
metres, litres, the sharp
measure of life,
stacked-up fish,
the texture of roofs with a cold sun in which
the weather vane falters,
the fine, frenzied ivory of potatoes,
wave on wave of tomatoes rolling down the sea.
And one morning all that was burning,
one morning the bonfires
leapt out of the earth
devouring human beings --
and from then on fire,
gunpowder from then on,
and from then on blood.
Bandits with planes and Moors,
bandits with finger-rings and duchesses,
bandits with black friars spattering blessings
came through the sky to kill children
and the blood of children ran through the streets
without fuss, like children's blood.
Jackals that the jackals would despise,
stones that the dry thistle would bite on and spit out,
vipers that the vipers would abominate!
Face to face with you I have seen the blood
of Spain tower like a tide
to drown you in one wave
of pride and knives!
Treacherous
generals:
see my dead house,
look at broken Spain :
from every house burning metal flows
instead of flowers,
from every socket of Spain
Spain emerges
and from every dead child a rifle with eyes,
and from every crime bullets are born
which will one day find
the bull's eye of your hearts.
And you'll ask: why doesn't his poetry
speak of dreams and leaves
and the great volcanoes of his native land?
Come and see the blood in the streets.
Come and see
The blood in the streets.
Come and see the blood
In the streets!
-- Pablo Neruda
You are going to ask: and where are the lilacs?
and the poppy-petalled metaphysics?
and the rain repeatedly spattering
its words and drilling them full
of apertures and birds?
I'll tell you all the news.
I lived in a suburb,
a suburb of Madrid, with bells,
and clocks, and trees.
From there you could look out
over Castille's dry face:
a leather ocean.
My house was called
the house of flowers, because in every cranny
geraniums burst: it was
a good-looking house
with its dogs and children.
Remember, Raul?
Eh, Rafel? Federico, do you remember
from under the ground
my balconies on which
the light of June drowned flowers in your mouth?
Brother, my brother!
Everything
loud with big voices, the salt of merchandises,
pile-ups of palpitating bread,
the stalls of my suburb of Arguelles with its statue
like a drained inkwell in a swirl of hake:
oil flowed into spoons,
a deep baying
of feet and hands swelled in the streets,
metres, litres, the sharp
measure of life,
stacked-up fish,
the texture of roofs with a cold sun in which
the weather vane falters,
the fine, frenzied ivory of potatoes,
wave on wave of tomatoes rolling down the sea.
And one morning all that was burning,
one morning the bonfires
leapt out of the earth
devouring human beings --
and from then on fire,
gunpowder from then on,
and from then on blood.
Bandits with planes and Moors,
bandits with finger-rings and duchesses,
bandits with black friars spattering blessings
came through the sky to kill children
and the blood of children ran through the streets
without fuss, like children's blood.
Jackals that the jackals would despise,
stones that the dry thistle would bite on and spit out,
vipers that the vipers would abominate!
Face to face with you I have seen the blood
of Spain tower like a tide
to drown you in one wave
of pride and knives!
Treacherous
generals:
see my dead house,
look at broken Spain :
from every house burning metal flows
instead of flowers,
from every socket of Spain
Spain emerges
and from every dead child a rifle with eyes,
and from every crime bullets are born
which will one day find
the bull's eye of your hearts.
And you'll ask: why doesn't his poetry
speak of dreams and leaves
and the great volcanoes of his native land?
Come and see the blood in the streets.
Come and see
The blood in the streets.
Come and see the blood
In the streets!
-- Pablo Neruda
Monday, December 12, 2005
12:01 AM (Stanley “Tookie” Williams)
© 12 December 2005, The Griot Poet
We lamented the birth of Margaret Sanger,
Bombing abortion clinics; stopping women from exercising their personal consent...
We compared Saddam Hussein to Hitler,
Bombing his country back to the stone ages in our rage to “kick someone’s assets” for 9-11...
We made Terry Schiavo our poster child,
Years having decayed her brain stem, most actions autonomic; all the while politicians’ manipulated events – “erring on the side of life” – making her husband look selfish, inhuman...
We convicted Scott Peterson
On circumstantial evidence, though he’d personally made his life a mess with premeditations to murder, perjury, adultery and a double life…
We've set double standards
Between the hyphens: birth – abortion; vegetation – euthanasia, imprisonment – death.
We speak of Christian virtues:
“Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are [these]; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
“Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,
“Envying, murders, drunkenness, reveling, and such like...”
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,
“Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.”
We speak with forked tongues
As the natives once said: recidivism versus redemption; straddling fences, going down two paths, splitting our pants as our groins stretch over an infinite chasm called...
Hypocrisy!
Gal 5: 19 – 21; Gal 5: 22 - 23
We lamented the birth of Margaret Sanger,
Bombing abortion clinics; stopping women from exercising their personal consent...
We compared Saddam Hussein to Hitler,
Bombing his country back to the stone ages in our rage to “kick someone’s assets” for 9-11...
We made Terry Schiavo our poster child,
Years having decayed her brain stem, most actions autonomic; all the while politicians’ manipulated events – “erring on the side of life” – making her husband look selfish, inhuman...
We convicted Scott Peterson
On circumstantial evidence, though he’d personally made his life a mess with premeditations to murder, perjury, adultery and a double life…
We've set double standards
Between the hyphens: birth – abortion; vegetation – euthanasia, imprisonment – death.
We speak of Christian virtues:
“Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are [these]; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
“Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,
“Envying, murders, drunkenness, reveling, and such like...”
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,
“Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.”
We speak with forked tongues
As the natives once said: recidivism versus redemption; straddling fences, going down two paths, splitting our pants as our groins stretch over an infinite chasm called...
Hypocrisy!
Gal 5: 19 – 21; Gal 5: 22 - 23
Saturday, November 12, 2005
She Sat
© 12 November 2005, The Griot Poet
She sat.
After a day of working for another, she sat with swollen, tired feet and beaten spirit.
You see, her mediocrity was reinforced by de facto writ: signs that said “whites only” for the best services rendered; “coloreds only” for entrances, seats and water fit for dogs.
She sat.
And the writ said she should not hog her seat, but give it up and go to her place at the back of the bus. But…
There was something about that day.
There was something about the way the bus driver said:
“Move back, heifer!
“Get a moving, gal!
“Get on back there… where your kind belongs!
She was a 42-year-old mature, married black woman:
Not a heifer.
And, no one's gal.
She’d worked in the budding Civil Rights movement, planned marches, sang songs of faith like “we shall overcome, someday,” truly the “substance of things hoped for; the evidence of things not [yet] seen.”
In her belief
That her faith would bring material reality to her expectations;
In her belief
That she would soon see the evidence of the labor everyone said – black and white – would bear no fruit.
In her belief
That she would live to see a country without the demeaning signs on entrances, seats and drinking fountains,
That she would live to see her people vote every November without the need of voting tests or poll taxes,
That she would live to see lynching become less frequent, southern trees bearing “strange fruit, blood on the leaves, blood on the root” and white sheets minimized (though now they where Armani three-piece)
She straightened her back, giving backbone to a movement that had otherwise stalled.
She nodded her head “no!”
She sat.
For our American hero, Rosa Parks: "My feet may be tired, but my soul is at rest."
Rest in peace, Rosa. We love you.
She sat.
After a day of working for another, she sat with swollen, tired feet and beaten spirit.
You see, her mediocrity was reinforced by de facto writ: signs that said “whites only” for the best services rendered; “coloreds only” for entrances, seats and water fit for dogs.
She sat.
And the writ said she should not hog her seat, but give it up and go to her place at the back of the bus. But…
There was something about that day.
There was something about the way the bus driver said:
“Move back, heifer!
“Get a moving, gal!
“Get on back there… where your kind belongs!
She was a 42-year-old mature, married black woman:
Not a heifer.
And, no one's gal.
She’d worked in the budding Civil Rights movement, planned marches, sang songs of faith like “we shall overcome, someday,” truly the “substance of things hoped for; the evidence of things not [yet] seen.”
In her belief
That her faith would bring material reality to her expectations;
In her belief
That she would soon see the evidence of the labor everyone said – black and white – would bear no fruit.
In her belief
That she would live to see a country without the demeaning signs on entrances, seats and drinking fountains,
That she would live to see her people vote every November without the need of voting tests or poll taxes,
That she would live to see lynching become less frequent, southern trees bearing “strange fruit, blood on the leaves, blood on the root” and white sheets minimized (though now they where Armani three-piece)
She straightened her back, giving backbone to a movement that had otherwise stalled.
She nodded her head “no!”
She sat.
For our American hero, Rosa Parks: "My feet may be tired, but my soul is at rest."
Rest in peace, Rosa. We love you.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)