power
The Streets are Talking
The streets are on fire.
Smoke coats our tongues
like iron in our blood.
We walk for our rights
as weedy paths like barbed
wire lacerate our ankles.
God is in our shouts.
Demands for justice pour
forth smelling of lilies.
Winds of hope on the horizon
are felt like cherry blossom,
delicate and beautiful
but not short lived.
How Can We Win
Watch this videoand recognise the truth.
In the act of love …
Transformations
Starting this week over on my Patreon Page, I’ll be sharing my back catalogue of poetry. Call is an archive, The Tending Black Archive. This is an exclusive resource made available to my supporters over there.
Head on over if you’re interested in joining the club.
Be Beautiful
Day 15 – NaPoWriMo – Musician
Ted Blaine, musician
After Gabrielle Calvocoressi
I journey back sometimes
and remember when I was riding
up front in that hot metal can.
I could see her in the rear mirror,
patting down here hair
and fixing her lipstick.
I should have done things
differently, little things,
like carried her bags
into the service elevator.
Let her know that I didn’t
think it was right, the way
they treated them Negroes.
One time, I heard her humming
while watching the world whizz by.
It was awful sweet the way
she could drift off into the music.
My mama was the same when she
had breath in her body. Sometimes
I dream of singing. Mostly
it’s that Billie’s comes back.
We’re traveling in the hot tin bus
but we’re upfront together
and she’s telling me
a thing or two about improvising
as the trumpet runs off
dancing with the piano.
Day 10 – nature has the right way of going about things
Listen.
Trees have
the whole story.
They
balance their
roots and canopy
So
every fibre
is provided for;
a
solid base
nourishes every thing.
I’m
going to
copy the trees.
I’m
going to
dig in deeper,
look
after my
foundations, to grow
tall
and wide
and bloom resplendent.
Day 8 – My Mother Forbad Us To Walk Backwards
After Anne Carson @carsonbot
The misty fret rolls
in from the North Sea
covering the bay
like a shroud.
There is no silence
when everything changes.
Grief strips the skin
from your body and leaves you raw.
Down along the shoreline
terns are turning and turning.
A question coaxed from your throat,
And this is how we love ourselves?
Onwards. There is so much beauty
in the world which you fail
to notice on a frenzy.
But if you allowed
each breath to be a prayer
you will enter the museum
of God and already
be inside of your body.
Living Wild Studios 