Haki Madhubuti's POETRY:
Haki Madhubuti (Don Lee)
change-up,
let's go for ourselves
both cheeks are broken now.
change-up,
move past the corner bar,
let yr/split lift u above that quick high.
change-up,
that tooth pick yuo're sucking on was
once a log.
change-up,
and yr/children will look at u differently
than we looked at our parents
will define herself. naturally.
will
talk/walk/live/&love her images. her
beauty will be. the only way to be is
to be. blackman take her. u don't need
music to move; yr/movement toward her
is music. & she'll do more than dance.
my brothers i will not tell you
who to love or not love
i will only say to you
that
Black women have not been
loved enough.
i will say to you
that
we are at war & that
Black men in america are
being removed from the
earth
like loose sand in a wind storm
and that the women Black are
three to each of us.
no
my brothers i will not tell you
who to love or not love
but
i will make you aware of our
self hating and hurting ways.
make you aware of whose bellies
you dropped from.
i will glue your ears to those images
you reflect which are not being
loved.
under volcanoes & timeless years within
watch
and low tones. Around corners, in deep caves among
misunderstood and sometimes meaningless sounds.
Cut beggars, outlaw pimps & whores. Resurrect work.
Check your distance blue. Come earthrise men
deepblack and ready, come sunbaked women rootculture on the move.
Just do what you're supposed to do, what you say you gonta do
not the impossible, not the unimaginative,
not copy clothed as original and surely
not bitter songs in european melodies. Take hold
do the necessary, the possible, the correctly simple
talk of mission & interpret destiny
put land and selfhood on the minds of our people
do the expected, do what all people do
reverse destruction. Capture tomorrows
if it is truth that binds
why are there
so many lies between
lovers?
if it is truth that is liberating
why
are people told:
they look good when they don't
they are loved when they aren't
everything is fine when it ain't
glad you're back when you're not.
Black people in america
may not be made for the truth
we wrap our lives in disco
and sunday sermons
while
selling false dreams to our children.
lies
are refundable,
can be bought on our revolving
charge cards as
we all catch truth
on the next go round
if
it doesn't hurt.