All the way live
and, every night, the bullets:
flying.
Even if you ain’t dying,
you a traumatized survivor.
When you grow up in a climate of
overriding violence,
you will never get beyond it -- it’ll always be
inside you.
And death?
Just surrounds you:
fallen classmates’ ghosts haunt you,
crime just calls you 'cause
you look
at what you walk through.
Ain’t certain if you’ll make it --
ain’t sure you even
want to.
...
(Tearsandsorrow
blockthesunlight
headlow heartbroke
eyesclosed tonguetied
Waters raise the tide
is climbing
Speeding time the sky is
crying
shots are fired
bombs & sirens war & riots
mourning
in America)
...
Now
that society forgot you, and they locked you
in an obstacle course where nothing’s possible --
if you slip up and they caught you,
they got boxes where they
lock you
make a million dollars off you.
...
They say they built our nation
for a reason --
then they stained it
with the bleeding
of the slaves that never seen it.
I ain’t hating (I still wanna believe it),
and I’m not trying
to leave it,
I just
call it how I see it.
