|
Quotes
"Great spirits have always
encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds."
-Albert Einstein
"One of the penalties for refusing to
participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your
inferiors -Plato
"Talking much about oneself can also be a
means to conceal oneself."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
"There is always some madness in love. But
there is also always some reason in madness."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
"Freedom is not worth having if it does not
include the freedom to make mistakes."
-Mahatma Gandhi
"Happiness is when what you think, what you
say, and what you do are in harmony."
-Mahatma Gandhi
Poems
Bloodletting
by Saul Williams
the greatest Americans
have not been born yet
they are waiting patiently
for the past to die
please give blood
those crumbled tablets
were to share a story
with a burning Bush
where is that voice from nowhere to remind us
that the holy ground we walk on, purified by native blood has rooted
trees
whose fallen leaves now colour code a sacred list of demands?
who among us can give translation of autumn's hues to morning news?
the anchor man
thrown overboard
has simply rooted us in history's repeating cycle
a nation in its Saturn years that won't acknowledge karma
where is that voice from nowhere, the ones your prophets spoke of?
there are voices from fear
disconnected from their diaphragms
dangling from coffee covered teeth
that spill into our laps
and scorch our privates
there are voices from the sides of necks
some already noosed
dangling participles
pronouns running for sentence serving life in corner offices
and ghetto corners
their voices are the same:
dead to themselves numb to the possibility of truth
existing beyond that which can be palmed into your hand, period.
there are voices of elders
which seem to do no more
than damn us to our childish ways for in many households wisdom no
longer
comes with age
so where is that voice from nowhere?
that burning bush?
that passing dove?
for i hear generals calling for ammunition presidents calling for arms
and
women calling for help
where is that voice from nowhere?
that god of abraham?
can he be heard over the gunfire
the wizz of passing missiles
the crash of buildings
the cries of children
the crack of bones
the shriek of sirens
or is that his mighty voice?
your angry god craving the sacrifice of generation's sons degenerate
your holy books
written in red ink
on burning sands
your prayers between rounds do no more than fasten the fate of your
children
to the hammered truth of your trigger
a truth that mushrooms
it's darkened cloud
over the rest of us
so that we too bear witness to the short lived fate
of a civilization that worships a male god
your weapons are phallic
all of them
that dummie that sits
on your lap is no longer
a worthwhile spectacle
his shrunken pale face
leaves little room for imagination
we have spotted your moving lips and have pinned the voice to it's
proper source
it is a source of madness
a source of hunger for power
a source of weakness
a source of evil
we have exited your coliseum and are encircling your box office
demanding
our families back
our cultures back
our rituals back
our gods back
so that we may return them to their proper source
the source of life
the source of creation
our mother's womb
the great goddess
we will cut through
the barbed wire hangers
and chastity belts
we will climb in and
incubate our spirits
through the winter
we will wait through
the degenerate course
of your repeated history
we will wait
for the past
to die
Untitled
by Saul Williams (taken from "She")
they say that I am a poet I wonder what
they would say if they saw me
from the inside I bottle emotions and
place them into the sea for others to unbottle on distant shores I am
unsure as to whether they ever reach and for that matter as to whether I
ever get my point across or my love
Ego Tripping (there may be
a reason why)
By: Nikki Giovanni
(my featured creative genius)
I was born in the Congo
I walked to the fertile crescent and built
the sphinx
I designed a pyramid so tough that a star
that only glows every one hundred years falls
into the center giving divine perfect light
I am bad
I sat on the throne
drinking nectar with Allah
I got hot and sent an ice age to Europe
to cool my thirst
My oldest daughter is nefertiti
the tears from my birth pains
created the Nile
I am a beautiful woman
I gazed on the forest and burned
out the Sahara desert
with a packet of goat's meat
and a change of clothes
I crossed it in two hours
I am a gazelle so swift
so swift you can't catch me
For a birthday present when he was three
I gave my son Hannibal an elephant
He gave me Rome for mother's day
My strength flows ever on
My son Noah built new/ark and
I stood proudly at the helm
as we sailed on a soft summer day
I turned myself into myself and was
Jesus
men intone my loving name
All praises All praises
I am the one who would save
I sowed diamonds in my back yard
My bowels deliver uranium
the filings from my fingernails are
semi-precious jewels
On a trip north
I caught a cold and blew
My nose giving oil to the arab world
I am so hip even my errors are correct
I sailed west to reach east and had to round off
the earth as I went
The hair from my head thinned and gold was laid
across three continents
I am so perfect so divine so ethereal so surreal
I cannot be comprehended except by my permission
I mean...I...can fly
like a bird in the sky...
Kidnap poem
By Nikki Giovanni
(my featured creative genius)
ever been kidnapped
by a poet
if I were a poet
I'd kidnap you
put you in my phrases and meter
you to Jones beach
or maybe Coney island
or maybe just to my house
lyric you in lilacs
dash you in the rain
blend into the beach
to complement my see
play the lyre for you
ode you with my love song
anything to win you
wrap you in the red Black green
show you off to mama
yeah if I were a poet I'd kid
nap you
Children's Rhymes
By: Langston Hughes
By what sends
the white kids
I ain't sent:
I know I can't
be President.
What don't bug
them white kids
sure bugs me:
We know everybody
ain't free.
Lies written down
for white folks
ain't for us a-tall:
Liberty And Justice--
Huh!--For All?
Cultural Exchange By
Langston Hughes
In the Quarter of the Negroes
Where the doors are doors of paper
Dust of dingy atoms
Blows a scratchy sound.
Amorphous jack-o'-Lanterns caper
And the wind won't wait for midnight
For fun to blow doors down.
By the river and the railroad
With fluid far-off goind
Boundaries bind unbinding
A whirl of whistles blowing.
No trains or steamboats going--
Yet Leontyne's unpacking.
In the Quarter of the Negroes
Where the doorknob lets in Lieder
More than German ever bore,
Her yesterday past grandpa--
Not of her own doing--
In a pot of collard greens
Is gently stewing.
Pushcarts fold and unfold
In a supermarket sea.
And we better find out, mama,
Where is the colored Laundromat
Since we move dup to Mount Vernon.
In the pot begin the paper doors
on the old iron stove what's cooking?
What's smelling, Leontyne?
Lieder, lovely Lieder
And a leaf of collard green.
Lovely Lieder, Leontyne.
You know, right at Christmas
They asked me if my blackness,
Would it rub off?
I said, Ask your mama.
Dreams and nightmares!
Nightmares, dreams, oh!
Dreaming that the Negroes
Of the South have taken over--
Voted all the Dixiecrats
Right out of power--
Comes the COLORED HOUR:
Martin Luther King is Governor of Georgia,
Dr. Rufus Clement his Chief Adviser,
A. Philip Randolph the High Grand Worthy.
In white pillared mansions
Sitting on their wide verandas,
Wealthy Negroes have white servants,
White sharecroppers work the black plantations,
And colored children have white mammies:
Mammy Faubus
Mammy Eastland
Mammy Wallace
Dear, dear darling old white mammies--
Sometimes even buried with our family.
Dear old
Mammy Faubus!
Culture, they say, is a two-way street:
Hand me my mint julep, mammy
1 million ways to burn by
Ursula Rucker
I look upon you
with eyes burnt from tears
sear the meat of my heart with
memories
of your hot/cold words
your dry ice words
sticking
stinging
singing
with vision blurred
I watch
our love go up in a frigid smoke
guess I got to close
I inhaled
I choked
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
Etched you name on my walls
with the fire in your touch
Our ardor once warmed like summer
soldered bodies
we swam
in simmering sweat
I
melting metal
softening
glowing fiery orange like the sun
bending
You
blacksmith
branding
At strangest times
I feel the heat of the iron
still
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
Like smoldering coals now
weaker
but able to burn
still
3rd degree
1st degree
This hurt turns angry
scalds
like freshly boiled tea water
spilled upon flesh
making skin bubble
then blister
later to heal
scarring
still
Etch my name on your wall with a caustic tongue
hope at strangest times you feel the heat
still
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
Shall we leave our love at the stake
within a fence of flames
sacrificed on an altar of discontent
sacrificed for no greater purpose
on an altar of self
for the purpose of self
Will the rains come
to douse or drown
Will we rebuild from the ember and ash
Or will nothing ever grow here
on this burnt earth
that was
us
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
slow burn, slow burn
Burn
from passion
or displeasure
Burn
slow burn
One million ways to burn
choose one
One million ways to burn
choose one
choose one
choose one
choose one
choose one
.
Hurry up!
Make haste!
|