If You See Something

Say Something, says the sign.
If you see something suspicious
speak up, alert the proper authorities
if you see something.

Like what I see
every morning in my mirror?
A brown-skinned woman in a headscarf,
a woman of no easily identifiable race? Well, I see her.

And I must tell you that she is suspicious—
deeply suspicious.

You see she does not really believe you when you say that her life will be better if she buys your products,
your skin-care products that promise to lighten away the warm tones she inherits from her parents
or your hair-care products for the hair she keeps covered to show pride in her religion.
She doubts you when you say this is a land of equal opportunity
because she does not think you will say that when she interviews for your job.
She is not sure the proper authorities have her best interests at heart
and she does not trust you when you say the innocent have nothing to fear.

If she is afraid, does that make her guilty?
If she is suspicious, do you blame her?
If you see her, what will you say?

*******

This poem combines elements of an earlier "If you See Something" and also "Nothing to Fear." I think it's matured nicely.

Available! High-Voltage Lines, Knocking from Inside

The Revolution Will Be On YouTube

The revolution will be on YouTube
You will be able to watch it in the comfort of your home
You will find the link on a mailing list
You will embed it in your MySpace page and post it to all of your favorite forums
The revolution will be on YouTube
They will no longer be able to hide the beatings and the shootings
They will not be able to lie about what happened
They will no longer be able to get away with murder because the revolution will be on YouTube
The revolution, the revolution will be uploaded, downloaded, served and streamed, it will be viewed
The revolution will be on your web browser
The revolution will be transparent
The revolution will not be televised, for the revolution is not owned by Fox News
The revolution is public property
There will be no more secrecy
There will be no more renditions, redactions, distractions or secret transactions when the revolution is on YouTube
When you my sisters and brothers are the eyes of the world, information will be free
The revolution will be free
We will all be free when the revolution is everywhere and the revolution is, and the revolution is, and the revolution is on YouTube!

Thank you, Gil Scott-Heron.

Collection available! Knocking from Inside

Corrugated

I'm corrugated (variegated, celebrated, interrogated)
stackable (implacable, retractable, uncrackable)
double-walled construction for extra strength

I'm disposable (compostable, opposable, reposable)
reusable (excusable, fusible, crucible)
waste-stream stowaway throwaway treasure

I'm resonant with resin and fined with fiberglass
a box-boned baby in a plastic mask
I'm a trash-fleshed statue on a city-park path
where the people with the corrugated faces pass.

--image by Karen Garrett via Poefusion

Collection available! Knocking from Inside

DJ God

readwritepoem's prompt this week is to use Sufi poetry as inspiration to write about God in an unexpected fashion.

I have to note a couple of things here:
1) this should not be taken as representative of Sufi practice, though Sufi practices do tend to include rhythm (chanting, dancing, drumming etc.)
2) yes, I know that clubs now don't use vinyl records except maybe for a few nostalgia joints; I myself don't own any vinyl records nor a record player, but I grew up with them
3) any description of God, poetic or otherwise, should be regarded as incomplete: God is infinite, and human language and understanding are finite.

In the juke-joint smoke and the neon flash
black vinyl dervish discs spin and roar and holler
diamond needles riding in the delicately ribbed
grooves where the speedbumps vibrate to a song
and God is the DJ who makes them ring
God is the DJ who makes them ring.

Crowds stream sweat as they stomp and shout
blinking in the strobe and the color-gel spots
breathing in the beat and the smoke and the steam
clouds above and the concrete underfoot
and God is the DJ who makes them shake
God is the DJ who makes them shake
God is the needle and the record and the song
God is the heat and the smoke and the sweat
God is the dance and the dancers and the floor
God is the DJ with the golden fist.


Collection available! Knocking from Inside

Circle II, Canto V: updated for the 21st century

Black glass altar with an ozone hum
drinks in the world over high-voltage wires.
Realities tremble on the tip of your thumb,
hurricanes changing to consumerist desires:
bruise-black makeup under black-glass shades,
full-frontal toe-cleavage fashionably shod,
camo-cloaked bandoliers of Tinkertoy grenades.
The must-have religion of a lipstick god
attractively packaged for whirlwindow-shop
summer-fun one-stop second-circle lust.
Ad campaigns suck your brain like a lemon-drop
remote-controlled in stereo, caught up in the dust-
devil rat race upper tier of Hell,
blowing in the wind with the other ones who fell.

--for Poefusion: Lipstick God
Collection available! Knocking from Inside

Don't Look Down

 

Don’t look down, it’s a long long way to fall...

from the top of your ivory tower
from the lapis lip of your private pool
from the golden height of your power
from the lap of wealth
to the bare dead earth
to the shantytown where the vultures rule
to the street that’s an open sewer
to the broken pavement
to the open grave meant
for the kids who never went to school
for the hopes that every day grow fewer
for the folks who live on garbage and gruel

Oh, don’t look down.

Sit on sand-castles til the tide comes in
don’t look down
Try out for tennis in a rising wind
don’t look down
This is the way it has always been
clocks don’t tick and nothing begins
but the gleam on your tower is the Reaper’s grin
so don’t look down.

Sao Paulo, Brazil. Image from Deputy Dog.

I'm Gonna Hack Your Rack

Poetry Thursday suggests: Write in a style you normally avoid.

Well, I normally avoid rap.

Actually, I hate the stuff.

Besides, this is a family-friendly blog.

So...

[cue threatening-sounding drum machine]

I'm gonna run your load
I'm gonna crash your node
You can watch my dust while I crack your cluster and I cut your mustard and you is busted
Yeah, my Trojan is explodin' and I got the codin' and it gives me the road in, so .pwd belongs to ME!
I'm rootin' your tree!
YOU CAN'T CATCH ME!
If you can't read hex or phreak Van Eck ain't no way in heck you gonna stop my exploit
Don't give me no lip I'll bust all your chips with my master script 'fore you sniff my packet
I'm gonna hack your rack
'Cause my hat is black
Your lame old version can't handle my incursion with infinite recursion and total subversion
You think you tough but you know you gonna suffer when I overrun your buffer and I hack your stack
I'm gonna crack your rack
'Cause my hat is black
HEY! I'M GONNA HACK YOUR RACK!

[repeat and fade]

Lay It On The Line

So your cups all broke and the luck ran out
And you feel fenced in or you feel fenced out
And your heart's full of fear and your heart's full of doubt
Then lay it on the line.

We've all felt the pinch, now the pinch feels tighter
And it's time to call on the lovers and the fighters
And the puppets and players and the blue-screen writers
They got to lay it all on the line.

Take your blighted hopes and your deathly fears
Take your worthless hours and your wasted years
Your father and your mother, your sister and your brother, your husband or your wife, your money or your life
It's all going down and it's all over town, so lay it all down on the line!

You've got smoke in your eyes from the trash-can fires
But the smoke can't disguise all the sharp razor-wires
And the smoke in the air can't hide the despair in your wide-open, smoke-stung eyes.
Don't close your eyes!

Do you ever stop to wonder what we've done?
Do you ever have the feeling that the compasses are reeling
And you can't tell the right from the wrong end of a gun?

All day at work and the TV every night
With your head kept down and you're tucked up tight
What the hell are you thinking?
You're a rat on a ship and the ship is sinking!
You're hanging by a thread, you might as well be dead, that's why you took up drugs and drinking.
Will you drown like a rat
Swim like a rat
Die like a rat
Fight like a rat in a hole?
Where is your soul?
Are you gonna lay it on the line?

If you've got a hand you can lay it on the line.
If you've got a heart you can lay it on the line.
If you've got a word you can lay it on the line.
Everything you've got, God knows it's not a lot, you've got to lay it all on the line!

There's a city in flood and a city on fire, the town was bombed and it's down to the wire
Well, the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker all said we'd have lots of time
But you poets and dreamers and you rock-and-roll screamers know we've got to lay it all on the line!

Lay it on the line
Lay it on the line
There ain't no reason and there ain't no rhyme
Lay it on the line
Lay it on the line
We're all out of space and we're all out of time
Lay it on the line
Lay it on the line
Stand up and be counted, you got to lay it all on the line!