I walk campus and wonder if I’m standing
on an unmarked grave. Are we under
concrete, grass, or any other forced terrains?
I wonder again, this time, if violence is
a remix of what the making of America
is while white boys blare music. They use
MAGA banners as decoration on white walls
down the hall from Starbucks. Is Starbucks
a stand-in for brother? Time is a mark
of body decay and not much else.

⸺

Before I was a poet, I was a lineage. One that
asked questions of the diner when they didn’t
let us in, one asking if I’d like my mocha
with the white chocolate as white girls
celebrate victory. Who wins when I decide
white. Before I was human, I was free,
which is the healthiest of human abstractions.
Free has the best marketing team. I am
the violence that forced itself into life.

⸺

In an alternate timeline, I was someone
with less life taken up by what kills me.
More sure I had a home, its history
singed in paneled pink walls. Sure
that it was mine and safe to dance in;
I was happier there, since there are
no inaugurations. There are no cameras
capturing my ending.

At the protest, I see them with their cameras.
They snapped faces of weary elders
in their cameras. They got BLM as hashtag,
Blackness as temporary and distant
in their cameras. Can they, through bright
silence and access to hope, see me?
They got the whole wide world watching us
perish. They got the whole wide world
in their terror-lens.

Turn off your Wi-Fi. Bring plenty
of water. Wear masks and gloves;
get up when they spray you.
Call for help, call for anybody
but them. Singe contacts on
your skin. They get mad when they
can see your camera. If you listen
to the chants enough times,
you’ll catch on perfectly. Broken hearts
in unison sound easy, like doomsday.

⸺

When the white folks come for me,
When the state troopers come for me,
When the graveyard comes for me,
When the Starbucks comes for me,
When the cameras come for me,
When Republicans come for me,
When Democrats come for me,
When my own demise comes for me,
Who will answer the door?

⸺

This is not my house. Someone else
must open it.

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