A funny thing, the English Language

Like how fish as a noun means one of 32,000 species

While fish as a verb means to attempt to kill them

It isn’t about whether or not you like him. It isn’t about whether or not you forgive him. It isn’t about whether you are a fan. It is about how loud and brutal our hatred is for a black man, even after his punishment is served.

We gather up our soldiers

When the price of nectar’s high

When the masses start to mumble

When it’s time for more to die

I’m forty-eight years old when I learn

my high school bully has died

An entitled white man’s knee,

under an unrestrained

and unpunished badge of law,

Grab a bib,

this is gonna get messy

Freedom is a cymbal crash

It is a saxophone screeching like a siren

in the absence of flashing red and blue lights

cry on your own

Don't cry in the real world

Don't go in the real world

There is no sweetness

in your sweetbread,

kindness was not

on the menu 

There’s I’m going to look the other way because it doesn’t affect me racism.

Pidge was nameless 

when the day began,

the day that was to be his last

Meatless Mondays

for those of us who

don’t want animals to suffer

...every day

Chlorine in my eyes

A wild potato

At the bottom of this bottomless pool

So I got a long vacation

It didn’t come with a dime

The poles along the main road

I no longer climb

Happy Cows?! Humanely Raised Hens?!

Have you been hitting grandpa’s liquor again?

A black stormtrooper 

has got me all stressed

Somebody help me,

I’m being oppressed!

America bursts out of our

elementary school books 

with glorious fanfare, fife and drum,

flag waving in the air,

I don’t want you to look at my words and think you are a terrible person

only to have him dragged away from you almost immediately, as you cry out in protest and despair

I pace in desperation,

my life reduced

to redundant circles

never leading me anywhere