Raw Beauty

A Letter to Myself

Dear Self,

I don’t remember exactly how it started
Where you are going or where it began
You often ask me if it’ll be worth it in the end
And I reply, hold on to faith at least until then

I have become your unwritten journal
The sanctuary for your most hidden thoughts
You, you’ve become my most precious jewel
Coal that only gets more valuable under heat and pressure
A diamond not roughed up enough

Your path has been mapped out for you
You have seen it in your dreams,
But I can not walk it for you
No one else can travel your road of success
Your journey is trademarked

You are worth more than gold
More valuable than your perception allows you to hold
Let it be what it will be, let the rest go
Your fate is no longer in your control
One day you will reach your target of becoming a man
Until then, move at God’s spee...

Life Bag of Sorrows

My last words to my forgotten man hood:

The blade's tip fore-played pleasure,
pressure waved salutations to pain,
and my skin proved permeable
as my cells were intruded by guilt.
All I have left
is a half ripped food lion bag
filled with sorrows.
Your apologies held less weight
than the feathers you flock with,
and so I quickly adopted two moral principles:
first;
I'm sorry is not an apology,
but rather an excuse to maliciously resume
beating my feelings worse than Rodney King's
battered chicken for flesh
second;
life's short...life's too short for some
so now I don't hold grudges
I hold liquor until my liver's content,
and blackouts elicit greater pleasure
than foursome orgasms to a nymph.
It's like
my whole life you've been fumbling
in your con-artist get-away bag of lies
searching for the right sized dag...

Malik

Here lies your road map
Your GPS to being a man

1. Always be a leader. Responsibility is sometimes stressful but more rewarding to lead to victory than follow the blind into a losing battle.
2. Define your morals early and stand by them. Stand for something or fall for anything. I think that’s how the saying goes.
3. Understand you are a diamond and so you must expect pressure. True diamonds never break under pressure they just shine.
4. There is no right. There is no wrong. There is only the truth. I learned early from a great man, the highest truth is being true to you. No one likes copies, stay original.
5. While some women react purely emotional, remember that if you are doing right continue no matter what anyone tells you. Not even me.
6. Every woman has the potential to be a queen. I stress this because as young men we often forget it takes a woman to carry a child, it takes a mother to raise one.
7. Y...

Chi-Raq

In my home town…
In Chicago…
In Chi-raq we witnessed more deaths last year
than Iraq during war with the U.S.

My home base is a battle ground
A war zone with no middle ground
We fill trenches with empty bodies
Play chicken with shallow graves

I’m from the city
Where even shooters with the prettiest of aims
Realize bullets have no names
So on any given day,
A corner you pick
Could force you to become a statistic

In my home
We play chicken with shallow graves
Raise our youth to be slaughtered cattle
Teach them at a young age to be mindless sheep
The blind leading the blind
And it’s been so many years of the same last names on obituaries
That fam doesn’t always get to say ily (I love you)
Before loved ones lose at chicken,
And bullets leave powdered stares in innocent chests

This is a ple...

Creatures of Habit

History will repeat itself
She will come back
They always do
What goes around comes around
So it only makes since
That we rebound like boomerangs
In a circle called life.

Endorphins burst out
We’re addicted to the pain
Or the need to heal
Warned about the dangers
Still proceeding to burn
Attracted to the pain of the flame
Like moths scorching in fiery desire
Of repetitious hesitations

Karma suggests
What goes around comes back around
She will need to come back around
They always return
Predictable, vulnerable creatures
Falling into the pot holes of habit
A street car named desire
On a road with no purpose
Decorated by dead end signs
What do they drive back to?
Barren lands and dented lanes of misery
Practice doesn’t always make perfect
Especially if you practice the wrong things...

Pretend

that the same way we discovered love
could bring amnesia to our conception of hate again?
Can we pretend,
for a moment only once race exist;
the human race, and we are only separated in the mind
by how much sun radiation touches pigment in skin?
Sometimes I don’t like the painting of my own skin!
Can we pretend,
that everyday causes unity
the terror of 9-11 all over again?

Most of today's conflictions
are our own human inflictions.
A society overdosed on paranoiac prescriptions,
we're living in a world on contradictions.
Aliens to the intellect dormant in our own minds,
sun absorbing zombies defined by our wasted time.

Seasons lost, ancestors buried.
Prisoners to history's repeat, ants hurried.
Microscopic fire-flying firefighters burning to take off,
small pieces to a bigger puzzle of peace
we are all God's fragments ...

Venting Part I

Blood splattered on her hand
As she waited for his money
Counting just enough change
To warm himself up for the morning
A coffee
Revolted from the thought of whatever sickness he had
She ran to the back of the store
“Ugh, I’m not taking his money”

Attempting to sustain professionalism
I walked up to the gentleman and finished the transaction
He coughed
I couldn’t help but notice the red droplets of shame resting on his fist
His eyes said thank you for recognizing I’m still human
As the group assembled outside he followed
With a smile he started conversation
Only pausing here and there to cough
He told his story

How his family abandoned his existence
How the woods had become his home, his resting grounds
How he walked the streets for an escape from his outdoor prison, ironic
How he learned to appreciate livin...

It's Not Rape

Her voice cracked
The podium stood still.
“It’s not rape if you get paid for it”
This was her opening line
That demanded the attention of so many eyes
She continued.
“I wrote this poem to say I forgive you”

“It’s not rape if you get paid for it”
Words shouted into my soul after every incident
It started with your boyfriend
He told me he wanted me to know what love was
I begged him not to love me
He stroked his manhood into my innocence
Until I came out of my innocent nut
My bed sheets stained by a punctured cherry
You washed the guilt away for some pay

I pleaded for you to love me
“You said it isn’t rape if you get high from it”
The only time you told me I was beautiful
Was after the powder blurred your vision
The local dope dealer
Dealt you an ultimatum you couldn...

Venting Part II

We stood outside to smoke
Somewhere between too late at night
And too early in the morning
We assembled like robots
Inhaling puffs of therapy
In the midst of systematic conversation
We took turns
Bouncing our problems off each others minds
Each waiting for his or her turn to let loose
All we needed was to vent.

After too many precious moments had been wasted
On trials and tribulations that in the large scale of things
Should never even matter,
A man who had been standing there unnoticed finally spoke
“At least you’re breathing”
This man, a statue of humility
He spoke with the authority of Mufasa
We sat as young cubs and listened

“Today’s my 50th birthday
To celebrate I think I’ll walk the town a little
Before going back to my woods”
He coughed up blood into his fist
Before taking...

The Lost Angel

 A soul misdirected
Needing to be intercepted by protection
I need your cold truth,
A touch of winter God
I’m trying to be your winner God
But in my heart’s center
I’m a sinner God
Praying for your righteousness to bring me closer to my center, God

Help me
Find my way into your complete image
No cliff notes, I need no abridged versions
Your completeness is perfection in your every word

It’s been years since I’ve sat in one of your pews
When you call upon me will you spew me?
Check my name into your book of permanence or act as if you never knew me
Truly,
I am honored that you ever used me
You are the greatest chess player, and I am privileged you saw this pawn
Deciding I was important enough in your strategy and moved me
And just when I though you had let loose of me, loosing me
You defended me twice...