Pamela Sneed asks, who will pray for us now America?
For Sandra Bland
I had just begun to relax
celebrate the marriage equality ruling
I had just begun feeling with Obama I was
watching Ali in trouble off the ropes
delivering to his opponents the rope-a-dope
my father’s eyes
excitement
I was just beginning to breathe air
feel exhilarated at images of
Joe Biden and President Obama running
down halls of the White House with rainbow flags
like boys with kites-soaring
I was just beginning to forgive deaths of my brothers
to AIDS
not forget
there should still be tribunals
for them and every woman abused
by the medical system
I had just begun to turn a corner on Mike Brown, Freddie Gray
Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, The massacre at AME
not think of it all everyday
Then the police kill this young Black girl in custody in Texas
claim she committed suicide
I remember we’re a war nation
in war times
I imagine how James, Bayard, Nina felt
seeing a nation turn its dogs, teeth, gas, hoses, bullets,
on children, adults, humans
I cant stop thinking about Steve Biko
his battered face
they say he hung himself too
the world’s outrage
who will pray now
for us
America
The Sweet Miracle of Whitney
On the day of Whitney Houston’s funeral
everything got released except white doves
the ceremony presidential, befitting of someone who
made great changes or impact
I held onto Kevin Costner’s words-the sweet miracle of Whitney
But when they hoisted up the casket carried it out
for the final goodbye, I lost it again and
wondered why
I could not stop crying over the death of a pop singer
I mean I was here in New York on 9/11
I saw the burning buildings, lists of the missing
smelled air of incinerated bodies for weeks afterwards
and I never cried until years later when I saw
in the newspaper a picture of two lovers jumping
hand in hand from the inferno of tower 2
Later I witnessed that reality show Being Ms. Bobby Brown or
something of that nature
and I saw and heard things from Whitney a real lady
just wouldn’t do
I’m not sure if the reason I cried had anything at all to do with
Whitney
but was more about the end of an era, not just her going
but everything that went with her- that time, innocence,
that kind of star, music you just assumed would always be there
and also
because we have lost so many my idol Etta James, Amy Winehouse,
Michael Jackson
and the soul train man who shot himself
I just got it soul train was the underground train to freedom
But I kept saying in my mind it’s all connected these deaths
Symptomatic of a deeper ill
America’s implosion
No accidents but a deeper ill bubbling beneath the surface
A reason why these celebrities and pop stars faces are coming back
bloated disfigured pill popping submerged underwater looking like
the newest versions of Emmett Till
two days ago it hit me, how it all relates, dots connected
with the recent murder of a 17 year old Trayvon Martin in Florida
murdered carrying no weapon, murdered because he was Black
a crime of race hatred and violence then it dawned on me
hit me again
like in all those countries where there are outbreaks, rashes of
violence and suicide
like in the 80’s in South Africa where students left the Universities
America is in a state of emergency
But meanwhile they have told us all to remain calm
go back to our houses remain quiet
go back to sleep sleep sleep
these are just random acts and incidents
but they know and will do anything to quell the unrest
that’s why they’ll use pepper sprays, excessive force against
innocent protestors
why they will do anything short of Kent state to quell unrest
use force reminiscent of the 80’s under apartheid
anything to keep an illegal, immoral regime in place
and I like Obama he’s a nice guy
but somebody made a deal sanctioned by the states to suppress us
by any means necessary
putting us under martial law and curfews in public spaces
I know when I left South Africa and returned here with new eyes
I said America got away with lots
a whole lot
PAMELA SNEED is a New York-based poet, writer and actress. Her most recent publication is Funeral Diva. She has been featured in the New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Time Out, Bomb, VIBE, and on the cover of New York Magazine. In 2015, she appeared in Art Forum and The Huffington Post. She hosted Queer Art Film at the IFC in New York City. She is author of most recently Funeral Diva, Imagine Being More Afraid of Freedom Than Slavery, published by Henry Holt in April 1998, KONG & Other Works, published by Vintage Entity Press (2009) and Lincoln (2014). In 2015, she published the chaplet Gift with Belladonna. She appears in Nikki Giovanni’s The 100 Best African American Poems. She has performed original works for sold out houses at Lincoln Center, P.S. 122, Ex-Teresa in Mexico City, The ICA London, The CCA in Glasgow Scotland, The Green Room in Manchester England, BAM Cafe, Central Park Summer Stage, Bronx Summer Stage and recently Columbia University’s Tribute to James Baldwin, The Whitney Museum and BRIC. At current, she teaches in the department of Journalism and Communication at LIU and is online faculty at Chicago’s School of the Art Institute teaching Human Rights and Writing Art. In 2016, She performed at the Poetry Project, NYU and Pratt Universities, Smack Mellon Gallery, was an artist- in- residence at Poet-Linc, Lincoln Center Education, and directed a final showcase at Lincoln Center Atrium. Her forthcoming Chapbook, Sweet Dreams, will be published by Belladonna in 2017.
For Pamela’s article: Before there was Caitlyn Jenner there was Stonewall click here
For more on the murder of Sandra Bland click here
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THEY TALK
As soon as you walk out
they talk
You Smile
they talk
You Suffer
they talk
You Are Successful
They talk,
While you ACT, let them talk.
You are now gone,
The wild blows with great power,
It seems to deliver me a message,
I think, is this you,
Soon I realize it is only nature.
My love for you will always be eternal,
And no matter what you will always be by my side.
Prince is gone, this feels so wrong,
to think we are left here with no goodbye,
makes me want to scream and cry,
I know he wanted to be free, to fly,
but why so soon to the sky,
he was a hero, a legend, and we all know legends never die.
His poetry reflects society as it is now. This is the primary purpose of poetry. How can we caisagtte him, or Obama for this? Perhaps if the police are offended by it, they need to change how they do business so they can get a better rep?
What is life if you can’t make the most of it?
What’s a smile when you’re not really happy?
What’s laughter when you really want to cry?
I’m so emotional when I took the loss
Is this all a joke and you’re still here?
No Justice, No Peace
If we can’t get it from the court
Then we’ll take it from the streets
No Justice, No Peace
I see it on the news, a man that killed a young man. He said it was in self defense but yet he glorifies the young man’s death. He said it was in self defense but he tries to make a profit from it. He says it was in self defense but he blames the parents for what happened. Rest in peace Trayvon Martin hopefull justice will be served in the end.
Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.
When will justice come,
When we try to fight for peace,
And they still kill my niece,
When will justice come,
When we try to save our friend,
And all they do is call a trend,
When will justice come,
When we have government support,
but they can’t be taken to court,
When will justice come,
When we are proven right,
And yet there is no else left in sight,
To carry on the fight.
What is really social injustice?
It’s when you want to fit in but people won’t let you enter
It’s when people bring you down for whatever reason
It’s when you have to settle on being the outcast
No one person should be a loud to feel as such
Too much depression, too much pain…
After all we’ve been through together,
All of the countless soothing whispers
and inanimate visions which spoke volumes;
About life, love,
Meanings and purposes
Ends in which to contrive
I wish I could say I’ll see you again
when I fade from the earth
But I’d sooner ask
What Makest Thou?
“Planet Earth, my home, my place
A capricious anomaly in the sea of space
Planet Earth are you just
Floating by, a cloud of dust
A minor globe, about to bust
A piece of metal bound to rust
A speck of matter in a mindless void
A lonely spaceship, a large asteroid”
-Poem by Michael Jackson
Observing home, observing the world
We see many things
All things but, love
We see hunger, segregation
We see climate change
We see hate
All of the, equal injustice
And none of them equal love
“Did you hear about the rose that grew from a crack in the concrete?
Proving nature’s law is wrong it learned to walk with out having feet.
Funny it seems, buy by keeping it’s dreams, it learned to breathe fresh air.
Long live the rose that grew from concrete when no one else ever cared.”
-Tupac Shakur
The rich stay rich
The poor stay poor
This is how social Injustice was born
Civil or human, economic or political
This whole concept is beyond cynical
Our children will suffer they might even fall
But did we do anything to prevent it at all?
Have we the heart to come together?
If we fail to do so, we will fall together.
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimmed;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to Time thou grow’st.
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
How can we get the world to care about the world? How can we learn that its not all about the trendy clothes or the newest smart phone? Reality will set into all when…when?
“Darkness all around”
Darkness over shadows us
but we find a light to give us hope
The darkness returns and puts out our light
now we are nothing
So tired of feeling numb,
I fight the darkness
but the darkness consumes me and I it
The darkness is gone and so am I
Who wins?