We spend and hoard
Ourselves into blind oblivion
Take a pill for any minor discomfort
Seek the product that will make us new
Beautiful, acceptable
Loved
Disregard our mortality
Aspiring permanence
Take more than we need
Realizing too late
Our legacy in
The young
More at https://www.taralynnhawk.com/.
And we all said, “Save the children!”
He was born to a mother
Who didn’t want him
And to a faceless father
And we all said, “Save the children!”
She was moved
From home to home
Her mother wanted a chance
But couldn’t care for her
And we all said, “Save the children!”
He has no one
To depend upon
Or defend him
No one to be his friend
To save him
He barely remembers
Each new address
Or each in a series
Of new schools
And we all said, “Save the children!”
She was beaten and bruised
Her self-esteem zero
That she awakened
Each morning
Was a miracle
And a torture
And we all said, “Save the children
He acted out
In every home
And in each school
As if to say
How far can I push you
Before you
Abandon me too
And we all said, “Save the children!”
Once there was a boy
About to be adopted
But he was hospitalized
For no apparent reason
And the adoptive parents
Got scared and left
And we all said, “Save the children!”
Once upon a time
There were many
Throwaway children
And we all asked
Are we saving our children
—–
From 1981 to 2006, I worked for the Los Angeles Unified School District as a psychologist and administrator of District Psychological Services. As an LMFT, I trained medical personnel in disaster preparedness via a FEMA grant awarded to Harbor UCLA Hospital and provided pro-bono bereavement counseling to those whose family members were dying of various forms of cancer and other disorders. Additionally, I earned a certificate in gerontology. Currently, I facilitate obtaining mental health services for the aged and others who need mental health or educational support services. I provide consulting services with regard to mental health needs/referrals and the education of regular education students and those with special needs. I have a great deal of experience as a presenter specific to at risk youth, including, but not limited to, suicide prevention, intervention and postvention (i.e., what services to provide after a completed suicide). In addition to having obtained a license as a Marriage and Family Therapist, I have Master’s degrees in Reading/Special Education and School Psychology and obtained a Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology. I have written poetry most of my life.
Endless rows of cement circles
Number after number
The shut away, the forgotten
The undeserving
Society’s trash
Abandoned
Given no name after death
Only a hole in an unwanted piece of ground
Dug by his brothers
The only family he had
At the end
More at https://www.taralynnhawk.com/.
Shoot a father before his toddler
Empty bullets into the belly of a baby-bearing mother
while her children outside her body watch
Wear a uniform
Bust through apartment homes and oak doors
Shoot by the road, river, under the moon and stars
Take two seconds to finish a child in the park
Bust a girl’s jaw in the library
Rain bullets in a parked car
Stand your ground until earth has holes
Arrest a woman for not signaling a lane change
Release her corpse from jail
Slam a child near a pool
Remove a son from his classroom desk
Choke a husband on the floor of a diner
Escalate
Escalate
Escalate your fear
Reach for the gun
You know you are always already free
Earn your bloody badge
Shoot while their dark hands are raised to heaven
Don’t.
Why is it that we must justify our humanity to you—even in death?
No, not death, murder.
Isn’t it bad enough to be stabbed by a white supremacist who hates me for my melanin?
Does it matter if I served my country or served in the penitentiary?
Not when I was just minding my business, waiting for an Uber to take me home after a long night.
But it matters for some—And I wonder why.
Can’t it be enough that I’m a person?
Or must I be exceptional to not deserve to be butchered in the street?
And the worst thing? The trickle-down effect.
No, I’m not talking Reaganomics, but he did play his role in the stigma
That a black man is dangerous—that one drug equals criminal
While the other equals treatment.
Why must someone be white to get sympathy?
I digress, for now.
The pain trickles down, for little black boys and little black girls.
And let us be honest, it’s not just the little ones.
We are strong; we are built strong, with the resolve of our ancestors,
Who took beatings,
Raping,
And inhumanity.
Yet, still they showed us that black is so powerful, so beautiful, and so unique.
And, in the irony and contradiction that is truly encompassed in the American Dream,
Teenage white kids, whose ancestors lynched us,
Beat us in the street,
And poured milkshakes over our heads,
Now imitate our walk and our talk,
And they want to be us…without really wanting to be us.
But in the end, how strong can we (do we) always have to be?
Self-doubt trickles down,
And even within our refuge of pride and self-worth,
There is bound to be a crack or two.
And the doubt of whether we deserve to live or exist seeps in
Because the whole world is telling us that our existence
Is conditional.
We talk to white kids about their mental health.
We tell them they deserve a second (and third and fourth and fifth) chance at life
Because they are so ingrained with this belief that the world is theirs for the taking.
Meanwhile, black boys and girls toil over whether they are even meant for the world.
Could it be that we are destroying these little boys and girls
Before the stabbings, the police shootings,
The choking,
And the traffic stops that result in our deaths?
Could it be that the problem is a society that tells little black boys and little black girls
That they are completely meaningless—
Unless they are perfect?
I’ll consult the court system that gives slaps on the wrist to the affluent lighter shades
While the darker shades serve long sentences
For the same offense.
So, in our desperation,
We acquiesce.
And we preempt you
By telling you that we aren’t criminals, thugs, or drug dealers.
We tell you that we serve our country and that we graduated from school.
But does my degree make me worthy?
Am I safe if I show you my non-existent criminal record
Or even my law degree?
Or could I still be murdered in the street,
And have naysayers reply with suspicion?
Even in death, we are America’s suspect.
And, by the way, just so you know,
I am not a thug.
More at https://twitter.com/marceliusb.
It is no small place
this devil’s field
where leopard’s blood
runs through the streets
like a constellation
cut from the sky.
Drunkards, drug pushers,
the cold amoebas that
die without seeing a dawn.
In Chinatown, the spell is
set loose, splitting
sidewalks with fury.
Waxen murderers, a barnyard
of devourers.
Inside,
lovers tremble,
clutched tightly together,
sensual and desperate,
anaesthetized by passion,
by common fear
of the cruel madness
that pounds and pursues
just outside their door,
where all
will never be
well nor
free.
And now leaves sprinkle
on dust
lovers play with morning
kisses of emerald dew
shadows lengthen
in dank crowded
shops
market places are shrouded
with omen
crows do the somersault
as a nation progresses
into inequity.