Mother of a black boy

My son told me, when he was four

or five, that

If I threw my heart in the river

I would change

the world. I guess 

I really don't have a choice 

in the matter, my son is 8 

now, climbs mountains, fences,
stays away from gated

communities and the like, 

I have yet to tell him that I am not so

concerned about his cavities

while I instruct to get a bag of plain

chips and no drink

when he, big man,

walks to the store half-

a block from my house

I haven't taught him how to

defer, politely, yield, stop

my son goes hard

and so I question

If I fucked up

if I made him think 

things were like a skittle commercial

though there are no

random gun fights in 

skittle commercials

and there are no frightened black boys with hoodies

and my son, 

middle name Courage

is often frightened

tugs his hoodie round his face

like a security blanket

trying to hide

vulnerability from me

when he asks me

if that is

another gunshot

and should he stay away from the windows

and what is death like

and what is it like to get shot

and why isn't it safe?

and he trembles just a bit and draws in on himself like a wind just chilled him and

now even if I hold him real tight

he still trembles a bit

cause the wind speaks to him

like I'm not even there.

Karma

You let Karma beat the shit out of you when fuck that... no really, fuck that... feeling bad about being celestial...

Guilt is quite paralyzing. Most of us got some sort of addiction to some sort of destruction of ourselves for not fitting into some dumb predetermined cultural meme.

That goes for the subsets of culture as well as the dominant culture in this society.

What will it cost for you to be yourself? What is it costing you not to be yourself? And what are you willing to lose to gain your soul?

Blood Lotus: An Online Literary Journal: BL #23

Blood Lotus: An Online Literary Journal: BL #23: In This Issue... I'm in here! Yay!

Lizzie Unicorn

i have an alter ego. her name is lizzie unicorn. and shes fucking awesome. and rainbows make her cum. cuz theyre fucking pretty as allllllllllllllll hell. and chocolate. and pink feazther boas. and boys and bois. and gurlz. and liiiiiife and fuck you if you can't fuck with the yummy vibration of the yummygasm/godgasm and go find your own bitter/hell vibration. cuz im ridin this cozmic feathered rainbeaued orgasm of a snake bitch gawdess to the finite. or the beginning. so muah!!!!!! love you. and fuck is my favorite word. cuz it goddam is. period.

spontaneous omens, sortilege and augary

it means you will break your heart over and over again
on an understanding rock
until you can breathe without the assistance
of a black and mild, wine flavor
plastic tip.

it means you will gather the pieces of what-you-are
and what-you-are not
and sift them over and over again
until this holographic feed
back loop makes sense
to your I-
computers.

It means you will speak
until the corners of your mouth crack
and you realize silence
tucked between
your words

It means you will handle ribboned winds
still katrina-bitter
and hope the flesh
in between your fingers
doesn't get brush-burned

It means you will fold your legs around Shiva's back
and collapse time into an 0
while trying to decipher the meaning of your grandma's
fish dreams at a copper T-crossroad

it means you will get lost
in the weight of your own story
riding your back while you sleep
until you at least attempt
to wake up

watch your mouth

we tend the avatars of

god with such cruelty.

perhaps we have all

been stoned 

in one way or the other

but this is no way

to grow people. we

hold time in our

bellies 

medicine or poison

flies on our tongues

a dove

or a nightbird for the entrails

what bitterness

reaps, its hard medicine.

on nights like this

our hearts are important

so don't smash another's flowerbed,
tend your own jasmine garden

Simon Says Genocide

genocide puts chemical burns on your scalp. geno
cide puts ulcers on your lungs in a
newport and black and mild way.

genocide is a language that hates you and everything
that looks like what
you might be
without
genoc

ide makes you scared of mirrors gen
ocide makes you wanna erase yourself
from the inside out

genocide teaches you you began with slavery,
had a hey-day with Lincoln,
and reached the promised land with King.

Genocide makes your name sound dumb.

genocide makes you smack her, slash her, attack her, cut her
womb with words and razors she look like
you though geno
cide means you don't care inside sometimes
cause you aint worth it

Genocide gives your baby a proper name.

genocide even wears kufis sometimes,
locs sometimes, afros sometimes,
my face sometimes,
your face sometimes,

genocide aspires to white femininity.

genocide means your music makes your ears bleed nigga/bitch/smut/slut/snap/jumpoff/whore/ho/ but
you hard enough to bear it
genocide means you dont mind the
bullets or redblue redblue redblue lights
geno

cide means you don't think about tomorrow
and you don't think about yesterday
and you try real damn hard not to think about today,
either,

genocide says shut up.

genocide tells you this is the way it's supposed to
be, this is life, this is in your blood, your birthright is
jordans and jailtime, geno

cide is sweet as a honeybun, from a corner store
selling chips and blunts and pills gen

ocide is a trap house on every corner
and the trappers trapped like the snaps is trapped
and this whole life's a trap, o snap!

It's genocide!

____________________________________________




It is our obligation to love ourselves
It is our obligation to heal from oppression
It is our obligation to strive to see ourselves for who we really are.
 It is our right to be gentle with ourselves.
It is our duty to practice self-care.
It is our right to know ourselves as divinity condensed
It is our choice to see ourselves as whole
It is our struggle to see ourselves as worth it
we are worth it, and worth our struggle
there is nothing more worth our breath, our blood, our tears, our sweat, our joy, our love
than our lives