Foreign Affairs

it’s a fact i hate to admit
but
i’m an alien
amongst these beings called humans-
a thing i once thought i was
until i could no longer relate to the
actions, attitudes and behaviors
of those once considered divine.

i realize  that
i could no longer assimilate
into the
pods, people and propaganda,
and quite simply the pranks played
by those that have found life to be a
joke!

when the world is in deep despair
games are being played
by those most needed
but sadly they could care less that
they was the key,
however acted more a lock
blocking out the path and way that
led to the much needed opening.

i was being splashed by the
cesspools and senselessness that saturated so many.
i,
once amongst that herd,
heard the call and
answered
even in the face of
all the ridicule and doubt like
passion being tainted by the thoughts that
passive is the same
and change is « selling out »
when Black folks have had to
grow and develop for hundreds of years
in a place once foreign,
now accepted as
home.

i don’t
and it shows when i cringe at the norms
and my language is called « proper »
when it’s not popping slang and
bang bang boogie
and slug tongued word shooting.
i stand for political and educational for Larry Hoover
and leave Big Meech for other’s choosing
coz a reckoning power
goes beyond ghetto fabulous walls and
funky prison chow halls-
we
corraled in
like fools
skipping to our own
extinction!

but i’m the different one
who has found a higher path-
not the fast lane
where death calls at an early age.
blessed to get passed my 20’s,
and though i’ve learned plenty much
it’s not enough
and i never thought knowledge would be this tough
but with it comes an obligation
that those who refute it
refuse to carry.

i’m not allowed to bury that responsability
coz that would be the ultimate disrespect
to the Creator that
enabled me to
live
and not fall
when the texacutioners called
and my daughter
(at 11)
stood taller than
all the women in th Black Caucus
and i’m supposed to
bow to the age old shit
that has destroyed my race.

look in my face
and understand that
surviving is a
threat to those that have induced the annihilation
and dealing with the sickness of those
that hink self-destruction is « real »
is a threat to my sanity
and ability to deal with the purpose set upon my life.

my daily walk is a fight to hold on
and not crumble
under those determined to fail
and nail their own coffin shut.
from the bunk to the casket
we’re laid out flat in a state of
drastic conditions
that breed us like pits-
lock jawed killas
that turn on master/foe/&friend alike;
loyalty lost
is the slush of Amerikan culture that says:
HUSH! Die in the clutchs of your own hands!

And so
i’m alien in this environment
that has delt me a harsh hand and
branded me less than man
and made my peers stand
against what we know should be right.
but
in spite of the odds
and stats
and social experts that
have written us off as
kooks, brutes and flukes
i remain more intune than i’ve ever been
coz i realize friends
are those with the same goals,
not the same clothes
and regardless to
race/gender/or sexual preference
those the most different
have the most commonality
bcoz our survival dépends on
«learning how to stand alone,
unpopular and sometimes reviled,
and how to make common cause
with those others identified as
outside the structures in order to
define and seek a world in which we can all flourish.
it is learning how to take our differences
and make them strengths. » *

and this
is what makes me think
being alien
amongst these beings
formerly know as humans
might not be so bad
afterall!

 

* from Audre Lorde’s « sister outsider »