Hey guys. In my presentation last week, I said that African American social realism is sometimes explicitly political and focuses on social problems. Well, here's a poem that I wrote that may not be completely social realist (as Hector said in the last class session, it's kind of hard thing to define), but kind of gets at the political/racial aspect of it.

A River That Runs White

Sadly I miss the days

when killers sought shadows to practice their trade.

Now they’re emboldened as the devil

cause you armed them like Reagan armed his despots,

advocate of life that you are.

You tossed them guns and told them to be careful.

You say he was a threat with his bare black hands.

Maybe he should’ve walked by daylight.

Maybe he shouldn’t have walked at all.

Maybe blacks and bullets are meant for eachother;

like soulmates, can’t have one without the other.

You claim every black is murdered in Chicago.

No matter where they lie, they were murdered in Chicago;

South Side projects encoded in their DNA.  

You "prove" this with your ugly smirk

and your book of stats,

once a sacrilegious ivory text

but only when it spoke of bodies piled high

in cinderblock slave-ships

or stigmatic rocks you planted in gardens

to stunt our growth.

You tossed them guns and told them to be fearful.

You armed the killers when you said

with your sickly sweet tongue

we should all be the color of water

from a river that runs white.

You hailed America’s latest and greatest

achievement: absolving our sins

with ballots. We made him and now

we can destroy him and be at ease.

And destroy him we shall, so that

the river runs white again.  

You spat on hallowed ground,

and excited the killer’s soul

wiped the cataract of doubt from his eyes    

yanked the muzzle from his mouth

broke the shackles on his hands

and then

You tossed him a gun and told him to be bold and brave.