HOME-BODY
Where I'm at.
My home is where my mind is. I try to open up to see things different, air out differences. But I like the same things. My way. You will like it too or go find another. I will change at any moment, so be ready to go.
You don’t have to smile, but don't frown at my honesty. I let it go soon as its said. I like to move on-not dance around and trip over it.
I just wanna sit. Enjoy my heaven for a minute. Between your eyes. Between your lips. Between your hips. Which-ever you choose to let me in. But pleasure makes me want to escape when it becomes painful to maintain.
Going through hell can bring peace. The fire of impatience makes it hard to see. I try to give, but the depth is suffocating. That may not be hard to hear but constant struggle makes difficult to speak.
SPAGHETTI DAY
Do you remember when you were told.---”You keep eatin that shit, that’s what you gonna become.”
Well.---Now that I am done ranting.
This is for my spaghetti lovers.
Those wiggly, long, slimey’s, flavored to your own belief. Slipping and sliding down.
Smooth and stringy like...
And the sauce.
Red and wet or White and sticky.
Don’t think.---Just dive in.
You will love the various seasonings.
Enjoy dinner tonight.
ON THE COUCH (GRIZZLY THERAPY)
Art by Kharbine Tapabor
If you’re thinking-He’s watching your curves as you sit. If you can move like the ocean of bodies searching for an escape. Wet from make-up sex and the pain of never recovering from mistakes.
Ahhh-you are half right.
This is why I don’t need therapy.
FUCK YOUR THERAPY!
LISTEN! I believe in it for people who can’t find another way to help themselves. At one point in my life, I thought I wanted to be a psychologist. But I’m always too busy working out my own problems-helping everyone I love-love me more. And the ones that don’t, well they just don’t know me intimately. Because everybody loves other people’s pain.
Listen. I talk to myself enough. I tell myself the truth-honest-brutal-sympathetic, enough to lay in my own bed and not shrink my issues into hourly rates cries and tissues.
If I want to kill myself or you, I know why. Everybody ain’t always happy.
Ahhh-I just thought of this-Listen! I don’t like being lectured or preached to because fathers and preachers let pussy make them foolish enough to fuck up families.
Now that was therapeutic.
DAD PSYCHOLOGY
Damn.
Stop chasing, the rapist of your life. Pleasure that has you sitting up late nights, rocking on the edge. Reaching to shut off your lights.
Refusing to look at the life's you shattered. All the beauty you made ugly. Because fuck faces are satisfying as rubbing a horrible wound while its healing.
What am I saying?
More money and more bitches. Everybody’s addiction. The only truth you can't deny. Like a man’s love adjusting and aging with his children. Growing strong as a tantrum, as they weaken from their first crush. Trying to break the bond before they get fucked.
He thinks?
What if I lose my daughter to my idea of perfection? Men reject their sons for less. Because our dreams were excused after we decided to let go. Then we pass as the ass. Shitting on everyone.
For no good reason. Just old, useless beliefs. But I get to use them to use somebody. I'm guilty but not responsible. Damn, I'm where they get it from.
URBANIA
Image created on Canva by Borcelle
People used to say “urban” as a slick way to let Blacks know we were too ghetto and hood. Only good as the fast food, speeding up our bad decisions.
As if they invented a new way of living, they advertise new beginnings. Keeping us collared, bundled, dirty as a dollar. While we pay to keep theirs white, our forced smiles entertain, as they watch us grimace to survive cold nights.
This city! Grey dreary, foggy most of the year. Mindful of the way it medicates depression. On every corner, through every mirror, patriot healers stand, leading another business succession.
Blossoming like virgins and cherries. The smell of the most vibrant narcotic. Potent as mind copulation that tingles the spine.
Powerful, calm and inviting. The reason the hood needs a mental plan. Common place for homes with the highest income to provide room on every corner to house a make-shift slum.
Here, it makes sense to be discourteous, where people like me chase revenge and can barely pay rent. Trying to clean by airing dirt, but nobody gets close enough to care for the ones hurting.
A place where we contract equality. And salaried caregivers become useless officials, teaching kids to get ahead by making drug deals. Concealing pollution, bodily discharge, needles from paraphernalia and shrubs-poking my pockets for bread.
The city attempts relief when I swell up with anger. Punishing small businesses and taxing the GAY and BIPOC community for trying to make equity more than a profitable statement.
A place covered with towering greenery. Landscape breathtaking as a redhead running through a field. Where I get fired on and shamed for defending my family.
To say they accomplished something, people try to befriend a N.I.G.G.A.—I mean a MAN like me.
THE HOLY SPIRIT
Art from Outkast album Stankonia
I stumbled up the stairs of the church’s basement. Exhausted and void of the giving spirit. I just watched angels stripping at the UNDERGROUND CLUB.
It was the only place I prayed for my devilish thoughts to come true. And was horrified when they did, but only for a moment because it felt like an escape I never wanted to return from.
It’s where I learned everything’s born from and rooted in some type of selfishness and sin. So, I never feel guilty about pleasure because I pay for everything I do.
The memory still burns like a sermon mysteriously describing all my current problems-making me think “one of these fuckers is telling all the business”.
The shivers and spirit of filling your partner’s holes and body during your godliest and their most vulnerable moment
THE BLUEPRINT
The school to prison pipeline is also mental.
Blacks are taught misery is where they belong. White authors with racist dialogue are more damaging than any rap song.
Image created on Canva by Yulia Frost Studios
Follow the scheme.
25 to life-go to school for 12 years and conform. Roll the dice hoping the next seven rewards. Debt sinks you to depths you can’t emerge from.
You don’t see any middle-aged Blacks raising anything but high blood pressure. Or a White flag, thinking it will shield and allow government assistance.
The school to prison pipeline is also mental. Blacks are taught misery is where they belong. White authors with racist dialogue are more damaging than any rap song.
Schools ban books that describe the entire horrible truth but require ones describing White supremacy. Encouraging students to imitate White leaders who destroyed civilizations and claimed self-defense in order to build their own. But teach Black leaders who mainly operated through peace, and proudly defended their families and homes were a threat to humanity.
Follow the scheme.
What type of business remains when the world knows they covered up lies? I’m not just talking about the cities where I live and frequent-Lacey and Olympia Washington.
I’m also talking about the North Thurston Public School District.
The adults in charge are insane. The youth have always had the greatest influence on culture and society, but adults refuse to listen.
So, let’s talk man to man or parent to parent. Since you claim your kids are here too. That’s obviously why the problem is worse.
Don’t roll your eyes or tense up, like when your real spouse pops up and sees you showing more affection to your work partner than your family.
But seriously what the fuck do you think you’re teaching students when you screw them over for trying to improve a broken system.
I know you see the anger, depression, and violence brewing because of your calculated ignorance.
Follow the scheme.
How much time do you expect to be given? You must think we are dumb because we’re not paid high salaries to teach low expectations. If you knock me down, then say "we will help you, but, only when you show patience. You know there has to be retaliation.
You think we're ignorant and don’t notice you giving more respect to livestock than our livelihood. But we have never been obedient or gone quiet to slaughter.
You swap us for grades and funds.
Operating as a Crime family. copping anything tying us to growth. You have meetings about our minds and say it’s none of our business when you fail us.
When I read the mis-education of the negro and the letters of Willie Lynch, all I could think was, we still going through this.
The district calls it business. But that's all cracking the Black mind ever was.
With brute force you couldn't penetrate. We hold the creators blood so we never hated. But how could we not take it personal.
The cities cracking down Blacks in business but reward White smoker’s dreams, pushing weight on every corner.
But I'm the ass-hole, when I expose the shit you say and do.
A new law was passed, to supposedly cut Black in, but let’s see who gets the raw deal when profits are divided.
Also, to the journalists, who refuse to listen. BSU’s issue with the district didn’t happen because of the basketball game. If you won’t print the truth, You are part of the problem.
KEEPING IT REAL
The cemetery where I’m from is a hotel for gangsters. The prisons standing guard in the background is home to everyone dying to get in.
Don’t get trapped in the system. We need the real ones teaching the youngen’s how the real world works.
O’l Boy
His two alters. Guiders and influencers of the life he desired and should’ve avoided. Perfect as a wedding day mirror swirling with images of single nights.
Ol’boy avoided glancing too long because his brain screamed danger, envy, and whispers that seduced women and men.
Ol’ boy sat in silence, trying to hide his heart. It was Shattering as he read, head down, avoiding his judges. His lips moved fast, slowing at words he wished he could erase by skipping. But the more he read, he repeated. The same disgusting sickening sickness. Cringe worthy, regretful words. Words that felt perfect when spit. When they nurtured selfishness.
Ol’ boy read the same words so many times his mind stuttered. He blinked hard to realign his sight and regain the cadence used to talk his way through life. Words of heartbreak. Yeah… bitch this, pussy that, N!!!er, cracker, blah, blah, blah. Along with other heartfelt, home bred, descriptions. Nothing too disrespectful or racist, only what the world now regards as offensive. You know- Man shit. Tough guy shit. The excusable excuses.
He thought, I didn’t, I couldn’t. He wanted to look up and say those words but kept his head down. Staring, as if the words would morph into a mother’s forgiveness.
Reaching the end, Ol’ boy read the words, Invitation to your final resting place. Now he looked up at the two… Things? Figures?
“Wait a minute, don’t I have time to change?” He hunched, struggling to inhale life.
His two alters. Guiders and influencers of the life he desired and should’ve avoided. Perfect as a wedding day mirror swirling with images of single nights. Ol’boy avoided glancing too long because his brain screamed danger, envy, and whispers that seduced women and men.
Starboy spoke ‘I want to give you a chance, but your habit is to waste it’
Pussy Bandit laughed, ‘You wanta play a game? You know you do.’ Then coldly, ‘If I were dying to survive, I would’
Ol’ boy sucked in a breath, tilting his head to allow more. He nodded and exhaled, craving the drugs shredding his lungs and body.
His alters presented the game pieces; a lighter, notebook and pen. Starboy struck the lighter, and watched calmly as the flame leaned, lunged towards, and grabbed at, its current soul mate.
Pussy Bandit gripped and extinguished the flame. ‘You have to write a love letter to your children before the fire burns the entire notebook.
A sting of regret shot through Ol’ boy like he was pissing out an infucktion. “What do I write?”
‘THEY’RE YOUR CHILDREN!’ Pussy Bandit snapped. He held up the notebook and continued. ‘That, similar to your life, is up to you’
“But. How does it change my life?”
Starboy looked at his twin ‘he still cannot make a good decision during great opportunities.’ Then slid his gaze towards Ol’ boy. ‘And THAT, is why you’re in this position.’
‘We should just let him suffer the end he chose?’.
Ol’ boy, waved his hand. He reached to retrieve the notebook, which Pussy Bandit reluctantly gave, after an explanation of rules.
‘The game is called branching. You are the root of your family tree. Growth depends on nurturing. Reaching people, and heights worthy of dreams.’
‘The twist is.’ He held up the lighter,
‘You have to finish before your fire burns you out.’
Starboy interrupted. ‘The fire never stops; and crying, yelling, or any movement other than writing makes it worse.’
Like a one-man band, Ol’ boy inhaled a wheeze, pointed with a conducting finger, and exhaled a nasally tune of words “I. Am. Ready.”
They handed O’l boy the pieces, and in unison stated. ‘Once you begin, don’t stop.’
O’l boy wrote fast and furiously. Hoping it would make sense.
Dear friends, family, children, selfishness is necessary selfish is necessary but making family pay for it your bad habits carelessness pulling the old baggage from childhood repacking refurbishing instead of throwing away the heavy burdening bruising waste, keeps you broke and poor but like all vices and destruction we find a way to pay and it normally breaks us make the gamble worth it.
He began to cry. The fire pinched the pinky of the hand he held the notebook with. He winced. He shook his hand. The fire bit hard. Ol’ boy slapped at the fire, which jumped to the notebook. Ol’ boy waved the notebook like a fan, but the fire held on and smiled, amused at the ride.
Pussy Bandit threw his hands up. Starboy held his hand out. Pussy Bandit handed over family pictures and birth certificates, as if losing a bet.
Ol’ boy slapped the notebook and pleaded.
‘I’m sorry. I want to live, why couldn’t it have been?” He Coughed.
The Fire: jumped to Ol ’boy’s head, leaving babies on the paper. Burning and gliding effortlessly with fearless beautiful chaos. Revealing the identical seduction of love, death and violence.
Ol’ boy scribbled fast, almost in a blur now. Trying not to think only made him think more. He glanced at the fire and swore he saw his own face and heard calm whistling between laughs.
Ashes branched up and out into life, air, the world. Whispering tears of old souls. Leaving behind the world they allowed.
ARE YOU A BELIEVER?
Yup-In myself.
I believe in my family. I believe in my friends. I believe most people age good. I believe in helping when I can.
Today that’s all that matters.
PAUL BEARER
He was there to put Peter in the ground. A solid man and friend. The rock was more than a nickname. He built and destroyed, depending on how you moved. You felt him before you saw him.
He always wondered; “Why was Black the color of mourning? Because Angels had to be Black if ghosts were White.”
It was cold out. Fellas pranced, rubbed their hands together, imagining a warm drink and soft body between them. Ladies were doing the I have to pee dance.
Paul smirked. His fists, bullets, and dick made people dance too.
My Favorite God (WOMAN)
Art by Mahsa Khazeni (Uterus no. 1)
Woman!
Wo-man!!
Whoa-man !!!
Your duality is unique.
Mistakenly looked upon as timid, but, you, make the toughest man weak.
Regardless of the ring, a king kneels to his queen.
Without the lioness, man’s pride does not eat.
Religion has lied and misled, stating you are the cause of sin and dread.
The truth is,
without WOMAN,
life would not exist.
…….Ahhhhh, GODDAMN
That body. That beauty. That booty. Those insides. Soft, wet, warm, kind and wild. Your Mind-see, man is not shallow or vain all the time.
Yes, I Know
Sometimes, what I do is wrong, but sometimes it’s necessary.
I can stomach my truth, so I don’t ignore the potency of my stench.
I let my scars hide what I haven’t recovered. I come from selfish love. Sweat and tears is how I make up.
If you want more, you have to help, or else do it yourself.
SAFE MOAN
Your gentleness is too rough- if, and because, I say so. Especially when you soften the blows. No matter how deep or pleasing the love, or the stroke when we…
Image from the movie Black Snake Moan
“I wish you would stop holding me. Your grip hurts; striking a nerve of stinging memories, burning with the venom of loves threats. I want to be let go. I want to be free to love, hurt, and heal myself, with my own help. Your gentleness is too rough- if, and because, I say so. Especially when you soften the blows. No matter how deep or pleasing the love, or the stroke when we fuck; it turns you, me- us, into monsters of our own making- the kind we make ourselves fear. Moans cover cries. Ravaging lust covers your eyes. We blind ourselves, hiding lies.”
Aida, ran up the stairs, slammed through the exit door. stumbled onto the gravel roof. She swatted through dust, darted to the ledge, and peered down. Her slender body swayed from the anxiety of chasing a different, better tomorrow.
She had been told many times, she was a strong woman- through sincere smiles, narrow, soul-searching eyes, and hugs held past welcome, to absorb, maybe, transfer pain. So, why was she about to take her life?
“What bug do humans resemble from up here?”
Horror stories crawled into her memory, scratching up tales, adults tell children about gravity; the man whose head exploded from a penny dropping onto it, or the meteoric dent in the ground caused by a falling grape.
“They never tell the truth.” She thought- “Love lifts you, then drops you into disgust-that is the truth about gravity.”
“Shit, that is the truth about love.”
She looked closer. “They look like roaches down there.”
She remembered, what you don't want, always sticks around.
“Why does the law of attraction, work bass-ackwards?”
The roof door banged open, jump-starting Aida’s legs. She scrambled further down the ledge, away from, and out of sight of Anton, who moved with scattering quickness, searching for her.
Anton, “The Butcher”, his moniker among men.” The Wife Butcher,” as he was known to what he called the lesser, opposite of the sexes, because they bleed out what should be private.
Anton suffered from the pulsating belief, he-man, created humanity, and was intellectually superior, not from original thought, but through, following histories leaders, and failures. And as often as man repeatedly brought humanity to failure, they continued to be followed.
Anton was led by two thoughts, “make them remember your name, and strike fear.” He believed this was more powerful than love, because it could not be mistaken, given away, or stolen.
Anton saw Aida and felt a frightening pain. The pain of losing to a woman. He ran, towards her with leaping strides. undecided, whether to push or grab her.
Aida jumped.
He stumbled, as we all do when chasing what doesn’t want or care to be held. He caught himself on the brick ledge, banged his fist, to punish and blame, and hoped a piece would loosen, so he could hit her with it on the way down, quickening her death, but mostly to- provide the finishing touch.
Death, unfulfilled life, is supposed to bring worry, flashing with images of regret as you avoid blinking, to catch, and hold onto every fleeting last image.
Anton’s disappointment comforted Aida. It was a rekindling of romance with her heart breaker. Aida, felt the hope of a victim, dreaming a villain’s revenge. The revenge of seducing Anton’s, brother, uncles, friends, business partners. Secretly taping her, and his affairs. Leaving behind recordings as gifts, for all to see, and secretly aborting their child.
Before she hit the ground, Aida woke up gasping for air. She looked over at Anton, sleeping peacefully, as if time was his mistress. He would wake up satisfied from yesterday’s infidelity, knowing today brought opportunity for more.
Aida slid out of bed, careful not to wake him. She peeked through the blinds, glimpsing freedom, which to her was like fire- an un-controllable danger. She had never allowed herself to get close. This morning, she moved towards it, feeling a comforting warmth, bubbling to a loving heat, blinding Anton to her new truth and power.
A GRATEFUL KID
Whoever said sinners go to hell ain’t do it right.
Just kidding.
The heat of stress burns hair and hope like open wounds and std’s. Strap up to stay protected from both.
I am grateful for surviving. Shots, second chances, on corners and in ovaries. I see why people love gambling. It’s the only time a miss can make you happy you lost.
Just kidding, but not really.
Whoever said sinners go to hell ain’t do it right.
Just kidding.
The heat burns hair and hope like open wounds and std’s. Strap up to stay protected from both.
I never know how to respond when someone says they will pray for me. Cause I don’t pray except for nosey, hateful people to leave me alone.
Just kidding. I don’t have time to think about them except for the peace I feel when they disappear.
My children are the only ones I always want to be around-most of the time. They make me realize just how much crime pays. I stole and broke a-lot of hearts to be rewarded with their beautiful faces.
You think I’m kidding.
The Bad District
“I wonder what’s wrong with kids these days?” “Everybody is so sensitive.” “They just need to deal with it and get over themselves.” “We had to".”
This is the good morning jane gets hit with instead of john’s wood.
They crawl out of bed, devour breakfast anti-depressants, and wash them down with morning therapy sessions.
Their kids hide under covers, trying to block out another day of school hate. Bruised from their distant parent’s ricocheting screams. Hoping like everyone else, they could just end it all.
Delicate Scars
Everytime I smell flowers I shiver. I wonder what souls pushed them up and what messages they want to deliver.
A beauty you can’t forget, dead before receiving the attention owed it.
FOOLISHNESS and LOATHING in the EVERGREEN STATE.
as kids, our real happiness came when the system gave us weapons and drugs, and they only got stronger, sexier and deadlier. That might be why I never developed a sense of humor.
Art by Overton Loyd
A weed smokers heaven. Where hell is a breath away.
Pick-up trucks with flags- American-Confederate- Blue Lives- Mericas favorite militias- the accepted racists, fills me with a calm rage from the poison they spew into the world. I haven’t broken down yet, but I’m running on fumes.
In my life, I have seen real, true power. Birth, love, heartbreak, war, revenge, kindness. The desperate begging for life to be spared, from bullets and knives fighting to end bloodlines. Eyes seeking murder and bodies fucking to avoid it. The momentum of winning and losing- all started from a thought.
I wasn’t alive during the civil rights movement, but I’m living in X and King’s constant un-rest since Blacks demanded a right to move freely, while the world claims they chased away money and quality of life. So, I know we all just can’t get along.
I’m a veteran. I live in a highly military populated state. Where the government claims to be indivisible from discrimination and racism but conducts deals, and hires leaders draped in it, on land they confessed to stealing. We have small towns and cities where people joke “there’s something in the water.” While feeding their families and keeping relationships fresh through permits authorizing the hunting and harassment of species with darker pigments.
This is why White people are anti-fragile. The magnitude in which they’re taught to remember their power versus how Blacks are taught to never know their own is nuclear.
But I know better, and I want that power for Black culture. For our violence to be tolerated and examined with a euro-centric eye, claiming color blindness. I want our celebration to be paid with currency that doesn’t include inditements when our popularity can’t be controlled.
I live where progressives are regressing, and right wingers spit scriptures with venom, seizing whatever sense is left. And it doesn’t matter which side they claim, their main goal is to prosper while barely helping anyone outside of their gang.
They pretend to be on your side and push you, deeper, creating the distance of divorced co-parents. The disturbing part is when you disagree, stating obvious, real facts-for the protection of humanity- you become combative, or racist, but if you’re black, you also become fragile. And that is unforgiveable and un-American.
I give no excuses, for myself or others failure. I just try to pull myself up without pulling others down. At some point, me and those who hate my existence have to go. And I’m trying to be as prepared as they are. But I haven’t mastered greed- the American way- funding both sides of a war I instigated and invited myself to. Persuading others to hate the new enemy I created.
Capitalism is the perfect policy. Those who disagree, are usually broke and die that way. Fighting racism mutes’ pockets. You don’t throw up anything except prayers-unless you’re a patriot who fights Americans. Proudly flashing the mediocre hero sign to assemble fellow pale skin domestic terrorists. That’s the only entertainment America loves more than rap music.
In this predominantly White state called the Evergreen, White people commit the majority of crimes against humanity. Un-reported with a supremacist’s influence, their crimes are not always against Blacks. But enough to fit the description of usual suspects. Making Black people feel as if any contact with them will leave our bodies as an exhibit.
Then our pain is rejoiced like a hymn making you dance and stomp your devilish shadow. I want to relieve myself of evil instead of life. And that’s almost better than a beauty with soft lips.
I think Black people care too much. This is another reason America labels us fragile, at-least mentally- which is another lie we waste time thinking we have to defeat. We take too many steps towards struggle lead by minds we can’t change. we get stuck as a threat and an afterthought, leaving our families praying for hope they never received from tithes or soaking up a bitter punch delivered from a blessed cup. Goddamn, we spend enough money toasting the dead homies.
We become scared to risk anyone else. We become paralyzed from heartache. And nobody, not even people who owe you will touch or help someone they think is sick or a waste of an investment.
as kids, our real happiness came when the system gave us weapons and drugs, AAANNNDDD-FUCK YEAH-they only got stronger, sexier and deadlier. That might be why I never developed a sense of humor.
Kids can always spot the weight of danger. The puddle from a parent’s tears, the gentle close or slam of a door. The Just coming to check on you versus- I got a call from school footsteps. The depressed look of the woman losing out on the wedding bouquet versus arrangements thrown on caskets. The medias organized racism of condemning Black gun violence-while comparing White’s to the first round of puberty.
Cynicism is deadly when it’s no longer a joke. And I never found anything funny or entertaining about the realness of racism. Because racists mean what they say, do what they mean, and kill at will.
And ain’t nothing realer or more gangster or terrorizing than that.
Today’s Rant
I use you.
You use me. How fucking useless.
I get mad. So do you.
That’s what I really want.
It’s all you do.
The fucking madness.
The mad fuck-exhausting!
You fucking mad?
You ask me to!
Fuck.
Anytime?
That’s all I wanna motherfucking do.