Juneteenth 2022 Poems
Poems from Untelling Tomorrows, Indelible Yesterdays: Juneteenth 2022
Ain’t I Enough
By Jessica D. Gallion
We are an unforgiven dance under a freedom sun
A tail-slapping praise marching in like screaming accordions and
hallelujah swamp water baptisms
To be a licorice hurricane trapped in the grin of humanity is
a blinding exhaustion
A muted scream asking to be evicted with every exhale
More withdrawn with every rifle to the head deposit in deaths
memory bank
Where numb-struck whiteness is a victim and terrified of erasure
WE are the curse, needing to be reversed
Meaning we are no more American than we are God’s child
Watch they say we wanted it like this
This thingness
All purple and rhythmic
A deafening convulsion Existing and disappearing in untelling tomorrows and indelible yesterdays
This blackness is warm
And dangerous
An untruth Orchestrated by a blasphemous tongue
A sinful symphonic Crescendoing countless attempts to oust these bodies since …forever
A membership paid in pain and prayer
Where human life potlikkers itself into a rolling boil at the height of evils flame
Because Nana ain’t spared
Child don’t mean innocent
Any one thing
can get it
And bullets were never assigned names,
Just aim and pull
Just aim and pull
Just aim and pull
Watch how names rain down like a gurgling drum in the palm of a mothers hand
A sickening empty in the pit of heaven
How many more levels of tired are there
How much longer before we reach the water
Tell me there is 50 stars waiting for me when this is all over
That my blood, is blood enough
Look at me
Don’tchu see me breathin’
How you think I got like this
Come smell the salt of the Atlantic on my skin
Pull the magnolias from my feet
Here, I’ll even let you touch my hair
You wanna taste my greens
Can’tchu hear the dirt of Louisiana in my mouth
I am a golden roux birthed from cast iron and constant whisking
A Survivor of unending wars that remind me… I BEEN Juneteenth
I got a family and a dream
Or will the flag never fly half-staff for me
©Jessica D Gallion 2022
No Animal
By Jessica D. Gallion
Black Man ain't no animal
Just because you hunt
shoot
and kill him for sport
Don't mean you get to trophy his head on precinct walls
Interestin’ how he never becomes endangered
Funny how he survives after years and years of buying
selling
trading
and killing him off
Black Man ain't no animal
And although he is rare bird,
Doesn't mean you get to strategically pluck and clip his wings with a full clip while we watch a clip of it on social media
See, he be ebony Phoenix
Rising despite gun smoke
Soaring high above expectations with every degree
Every black owned business
Every sacred marriage
Every son and daughter that knows him and every community that depends on him for their very existence
I'm telling you,
He ain't no animal
Because if he was
He would have ripped yo ass open long time ago
Sank his teeth in,
dragged your lifeless body back into the cave
Devoured your ignorance
discarded your bones for all to see
See,
He don't want none of yo kind running though his veins
Never wants to become like the animals that treat him like prey
But since he is hunted,
He knows when to run
How to hide
Doing his best to dodge bullets
Traps and trick ropes… just so he don't end up hanging from one
BLACK MAN AIN'T NO ANIMAL
RUNNIN’ DON’T MAKE HIM NO PUNK
He is breakin’ free from the cage they tried to put him in
He could never be tamed or trained
No matter how much you whip him,
The shape he is in will never be for your benefit
The day he turns animal, is the day,
The jungle falls
©Jessica D Gallion 2016
From Can’t No Woman, Woman Like Me Published with World Stage Press
1830
By Hiram Sims
They use to kill us for this
Force Fed us death sentences for writing down sentences
Penned down and murdered for the right to write on pen and paper. Lined up on a firing wall for these fragments
Subject to the pulling of triggers for subject verb agreement
My grandmothers perished for paragraphs
Indented on indentured servitude in this peculiar institution
They use to kill us for this
My grandfathers pronounced dead for hiding pronouns under their pillows Vocabulary pouring out with the blood, forbidden ink oozing out of their pores Mutilated for our metaphors
Decapitated for their Capital letters
Killed for the curiosity of quadratic equations
my kinfolk slaughtered for synonyms
Transitioning for transitive verbs written on the walls of a slave cabin
lynched for their lexicon
knocked off for these noun conjugations
run down for these run-on sentences
my mothers massacred for writing their monikers
just for writing their names
beautiful brown leaves hanging from the branches of my family tree terminated for their terminology
We use to die for this
America’s southern graves are filled with students
Who looked like us, walked like us, wanted to learn
Like us And when they speak to me at night
From their shallow graves in Arkansas
As I contemplate the thought of being furious
They say, do not be Angry for Me
Read for Me, Write for Me,
Spell for me, study for me, learn for me, speak for me
Read for Me, Write for Me,
Read for Me, Write for Me
And live
© Hiram Sims
AN ACT TO PREVENT ALL PERSONS FROM TEACHING SLAVES TO READ OR WRITE, THE USE OF FIGURES EXCEPTED
Whereas the teaching of slaves to read and write, has a tendency to excite dis-satisfaction in their minds, and to produce insurrection and rebellion, to the manifest injury of the citizens of this State:
Therefore,
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That any free person, who shall hereafter teach, or attempt to teach, any slave within the State to read or write, the use of figures excepted, or shall give or sell to such slave or slaves any books or pamphlets, shall be liable to indictment in any court of record in this State having jurisdiction thereof, and upon conviction, shall, at the discretion of the court, if a white man or woman, be fined not less than one hundred dollars, nor more than two hundred dollars, or imprisoned; and if a free person of color, shall be fined, imprisoned, or whipped, at the discretion of the court, not exceeding thirty nine lashes, nor less than twenty lashes.
II. Be it further enacted, That if any slave shall hereafter teach, or attempt to teach, any other slave to read or write, the use of figures excepted, he or she may be carried before any justice of the peace, and on conviction thereof, shall be sentenced to receive thirty nine lashes on his or her bare back.
III. Be it further enacted, That the judges of the Superior Courts and the justices of the County Courts shall give this act in charge to the grand juries of their respective counties.
Source: "Act Passed by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina at the Session of 1830—1831" (Raleigh: 1831).
Significant anti-black laws include:
1829, Georgia: Prohibited teaching blacks to read, punished by fine and imprisonment[8]
1832, Alabama and Virginia: Prohibited whites from teaching blacks to read or write, punished by fines and floggings
1833, Georgia: Prohibited blacks from working in reading or writing jobs (via an employment law), and prohibited teaching blacks, punished by fines and whippings (via an anti-literacy law)
1847, Missouri: Prohibited assembling or teaching slaves to read or write
Between 1740 and 1834 Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North and South Carolina, and Virginia all passed anti-literacy laws. South Carolina prohibited teaching slaves to read and write, punishable by a fine of 100 pounds and six months in prison, via an amendment to its 1739 Negro Act
black folk know what they know
By Conney D. Williams
Black folk and superstition
go together
like chicken and waffles
mama said, “we know what we know”
constitution fraction us
as though we are not
our own witnesses
we drag the umbilical cord
of Black mythology
round our necks
we fear boogie men
and commodity trading
the way America imagines itself
reprogram the memory of history
building true versions of lies
the way you wear your Black
masquerade as incantation
When was America Great?
idealistic slave holders
dream messaging and utopia
where Black folk never realize
they were human all the time
we return you to your
regularly scheduled programming
these truths are self evident
White privilege a coma out of context
Black’s nothing more than allegory
my community know Lady Justice
got turned out a long time ago
that hooker no longer blushes
eyes gouged, she probably wishes she
could wash her hands like Pontius Pilate
casting spells to absolve himself
but realize this ain’t destiny but fate
dice always roll snake eyes
Daddy said, “we know what we know”
like when massa preached
“slaves obey your masters”
black folk was like, “yeah right, motherf*cker”
they knew massa couldn’t be talking about
the same Jesus they grew up with
in Egypt with nappy locks of hair
moved to some projects in Galilee
Black folk known more than rivers
we learned to walk on water
without the assistance of a Messiah
Black folk ain’t never believed
in no White Santa Claus no Easter bunny
people from my neighborhood
doubted forever that Neil Armstrong
leaped for all mankind
on the dark side of the moon
prosecution of a police officer
nothing more than sad fairy tales
across the vastness of Black
engulfed by exploitation & stereotype
we learned to disrobe our faith
transform naked from scars, we know
superstition stitched in our housecoat
cos’ of alterations made by colonizers
only take them one generation
convince Black Folk they God
ain’t really no God
what kind of name for God
is Ogun & Oshun, Shango & Yemaya
Black tradition only incantation
the White God the only God
everybody know Jesus favor Jeffrey Hunter
with blonde hair & blue eyes
I know you’ve seen his picture
hanging in your grandmother’s kitchen
the White heaven the only heaven
the notion of Jefferson’s equality
ain’t nothing cept White noise
has no traction in Watts or Leimert Park
the prism through which
Black folk view one nation under God
is never indivisible or for ALL
Black folk in America
born on imbalanced scales that
spill niggas into profitable prisons
or street corner executions
told you Black folk superstitious
if you let the constitution explain it
everybody got a equal chance
but you tell me what country
get a 400 year head start on capitalism
with all that free Black labor
I know what you’re saying
all Black Folk do is play the victim
the chorus is never unrehearsed
we know
what your Chicago references mean
how it explains who you are
as though we hire thugs
to protect and serve we know
your blame a nigga handbook
save the advertisement
we know how the birth of a nation ends
we’ve known outgunned
we know crack and contras
got Reagan elected to a 2nd term
yet Black folks only cast in “B” movies
we saw that bootleg video
that defenseless Black body
hands in worship running in reverse
sprawled & splattered like
the chalk lines of a FBI informant
across television pavement and a Simi Valley courtroom
you sabotage our every movement
blackmail is an ironic word
J. Edgar cross dressed King & the Panthers
black bodies lack the kind of gaskets
that prevent loss of scarlet memory
make up your mind
you want us subservient or compliant
we already know
whether you Republican or Democrat
you only gonna ride so far with us
only difference one more upfront
Republicans appreciate niggas
self loathing in their demographic
Democrats want niggas who like
bounced checks over real change
White America almost never believe
when Black people say how they feel
when we say that we were murdered
and the video was not grainy
even as Black folk
call for mamas
instead of pleading the 5th
ain’t nothing unbelievable about reruns
with unchangeable plots
Mama said, “we know what we know”
© Conney D. Williams
humanity builds shrines
By Conney D. Williams
(I heard them) South Carolina flesh terrorists
exhume their prosperity from Nat Turner wallets
Mein Kampf for secessionist memoirs
it is the new millennium inside AmeriKKKa’s killings fields
virgin cotton swabbed in exploitation
I am blue from red and white welts
the American swastika waves above Columbia
South Carolina shitty confederate diapers
General Lee still fights for control of Gettysburg
while Aryan nations due south of Mason-Dixon line
memorialize Ku Kluck and Klan
whose membership revoked for not paying Union dues
these unkempt sheets silk their arrogance
with latent debutantes un-chaperoned
in their Gestapo waltz
they lobby for new civil war and neophyte niggaz
but reluctant African passengers
vacationing on American Colonial Cruise Lines
to exotic destinations like Jamestown or Monticello
coagulate for a shackled coup d’état
no recovery effort was organized
for the misplaced American Negro
America’s amnesia is a terminal hematoma
what is America’s indignation
with those incredulous American niggaz
never embrace enslavement as cause for celebration
unthankful for their improved economic status
apologists erect a pageantry of indifference
then parade their litany of anti-heroes
Mississippi hosts secession banquets
while the governor of Virginia confirm
the proclamation of original sin
these revisionists want a slavery
that honors the phantoms of their past
“what are black folk so mad about?”
this is America’s reparations
to memory of my great, great, great grandfather
and for exploited servitude boycott
and I will no longer worship ol’ glory’s despicable altar
or succumb to history of demystification
because I am not jack’s-son or jeffer’s son
my birth is from the womb of Yoruba
where humanity builds our shrines
© Conney D. Williams