Death by Murakami (A Found Poem)

green-felt pool tables,
chunky paperweights in
police interrogation rooms,
smoke rising from tall
crematorium smokestacks,
white flowers on school desks,
gas station receipt 
tucked under the windshield wiper,
suffocating contradiction,
endlessly spinning in circles,
I have no idea how long
it took him to die

 

 

Found poetry,
All lines are direct quotes from the last two pages of the second chapter of Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood

 

25 Jul 2020

The Darkness of Dawn’s Early Light

America,

land of the free,

home of the incarcerated

 

Where we pretend not to

notice the contradiction

 

America,

where we cling to 

the second amendment

while firing rubber bullets 

and tear gas at the first

 

America,

where we continue

to idolize slave owners

and cruel colonizers,

but laugh at the thought

that racism might still exist

 

America,

home of the homeless,

those cast aside,

not worthy of a

fucking sandwich

 

There are too many

hungry billionaires to feed,

mouths bloody

from the carcasses

of the former middle class

 

So we avert our gaze

from the poor, the hungry,

the sodden souls

trapped beneath the heavy boot

of society’s indifference, 

leaving their bodies 

to slowly rot in the street

 

America,

hating our neighbors

while cradling our Bibles tightly 

like the elusive embryos

we will cease to care for

the moment they make 

their watery exit

from the birth canal

 

America,

where the claim to be the greatest

is left conveniently untangled 

from the messiness of reality

 

29 Jul 2020

Hear it performed

Guesswork

It seems the very same people who won’t wear a mask because “God will protect me from COVID,” think we need a military budget that dwarfs the rest of the world, a wall to protect us from Mexicans, and riot gear to protect us from equality. I guess God only deals in infectious diseases.

Some of y’all think you need to listen and study your religion every single week, spending countless hours examining how you can improve in your thoughts and actions. Yet you think you already inherently know all about racism, something you’ve never actually taken the time to study in any depth, and any examination or self-reflection is unnecessary. Or you think the racism this country was founded on and consistently throughout its history fought to maintain just magically disappeared somewhere along the way. 

I guess you do believe in miracles.

15 Jun 2020

The Angle of Perception

The man sitting in a field quietly gazing into nature 

looked a lot more peaceful before I noticed 

the rifle in his hands

10 Jul 2020

Meddling, Malevolent Marmots

“The marmot is believed to have caused the 1911 pneumonic plague epidemic,” the CNN article reads.

Not “human trapping, killing, and widespread trading of the marmot’s fur infected thousands.” Nope. Just like “humans were minding our own damn business and the evil fucking marmots infected us.”

Humans won’t take the blame for anything.

We blame cows for going mad when we force them into cannibalism.

We blame deer and rabbits because they, like us, enjoy nibbling on plants, while we blame wolves and coyotes for enjoying the taste of animal flesh. How dare they also know hunger!

Even when they avoid veggies and farmed animals, desiring only the scraps we’ve already discarded, we blame raccoons for eating our trash.

We blame animals because they don’t perfectly preserve our lawns and golf courses. You know, like how we perfectly preserve their forests and grasslands.

We blame certain cats for our bad luck.

We blame dogs for eating our homework. 

We even blame a snake for making an apple enticing.

We blame cows for their farts without blaming ourselves for the mass breeding that puts them here.

We blame the deer for “hitting” our cars, though we were the ones in motion.

No self-examination. 

No acceptance of responsibility. 

Always their fault.

We are like Jeffrey Dahmer blaming our victim for the food poisoning.

8 Jul 2020

CNN article referenced

Bullet Points

Homework assignment for anyone 

who shares any variation of 

“the police won’t bother you 

if you don’t break the law”

• Step 1: 

Outline each law 

broken by Elijah McClain

Include sub headings

• Step 2:

Quote the criminal codes

violated by Atatiana Jefferson

Use footnotes

• Step 3:

Brainstorm twelve ways

Amadou Diallo could have 

more legally danced between 

the forty-one bullets fired at him

Be prepared to discuss 

your thoughts in class

• Step 4:

Write a biography 

on the seven-year life

of Aiyana Jones 

Annotate any illegality 

• Step 5:

Summarize the penal code

infringements of Tamir Rice

Submit via Google Classroom

• Step 6:

Create a Venn-Diagram

to show the intersection

of the laws broken 

by John Crawford 

and Botham Jean 

• Step 7:

Explain,

in a sonnet,

how Breonna Taylor 

could have slept more lawfully

• Step 8:

List the legal missteps

of Philando Castile

Use bullet points

• Step 9:

Write a twelve-page 

research paper

on stop and frisk policies

Single-spaced

• Step 10:

Create a Power Point

on the history 

of racial profiling 

Cite at least four sources

• Step 11:

Multiple Choice:

Find the law that calls for 

immediate street execution

a) failure to use a turn signal

b) suspected use of a forged twenty-dollar bill

c) accusations of selling cigarettes without a license

d) a broken tail light

• Step 12:

Stand in front of the class

and recite the first amendment

Use Google or Wikipedia if necessary

• Step 13:

Watch at least ten videos

of police turning tear gas

and rubber bullets on those

exercising their first amendment rights

Personal reflection due Monday

• Step 14: 

Write a limerick or a haiku

about the racism and privilege

you now see reflected in your mirror

• Step 15:

Repeat until you 

realize how fucking 

clueless you sound

2 Jul 2020

Watch it performed with Holbrook Riles III

Watch it performed in collaboration with Zach's Lives Before and Above

Beneath the Tide

There is blood on the street

Blood now smeared on jogging shoes

and a twenty-dollar bill

There is blood on the street

and it coats toy guns

and Walmart purchases

and legal gun permits

There is blood on the street

and it seeps over

all five flavors of Skittles

There is blood on the street 

where paid executioners,

awaiting the next neck,

sharpen the blades 

of their guillotine 

There is blood on the street 

and our tires continue 

their rotations as if it were 

but a minor inconvenience

There is blood on the street 

and it covers the tears, 

pleas, vomit, and finally silence 

of Elijah McClain’s 

open-face ski mask

There is blood on the street 

and it has left indelible stains

on grandma’s backyard

There is blood on the street 

collecting until it flows

like a river

A river so deep

that many are sucked

under its current,

gasping for a final breath

There is blood on the street 

The rapids crashing 

through windows and doors

of presumed safety

There is blood on the street 

that fails to signal

for a lane change

as it devastates

a Wendy’s parking lot

There is blood on the street 

A river of blood

beneath the valleys 

of indifference

and intimidation

There is blood on the street 

cutting a canyon 

of pain and suffering 

and lost childhood

There is blood on the street 

and it has sullied

our unwashed hands 

There is blood on the street

but even as the evidence

pools at our feet,

many continue to deny 

the existence of bloodstains

There is blood on the street 

but some cry how we need

to protect the asphalt

There is blood 

There is blood 

There is blood 

                                on the street 

1 Jul 2020

Watch the Poem Performed by Sixteen Poets