Longing.....

Digging in the desert sand for water

Feening for what will give me life

This dry spell

Leaving me parched and malnourished

I thirst for a drink

A cold swallow of a unrelenting cool

The need for it racked within my body

Just when I think it has been found

I realize I was.....

Allowing a mirage to take over for it to only leave me discontent and broken

Disillusioned in my search

I touch upon the remnants of the drops held but never finding the satisfaction of quenching it

Even within the midst of a storm 

My hands allowing the drops of potential slip through my fingers

Leaving no way to contain the water

Bringing me back to square one

I huddle 

On my knees

Praying for the day to end and sleep to come 

Wishing upon dreams in order to forget 

Even for a moment

How my body clenches for that thirst

Do the work

Do the work

I been watching you for countless years

Do the work

I’ve been nudging you for more then a few years

Do the work

Time ain’t standing still through your tears

Do the work 

do the work

I thought I told you to do the work

I equipped in you the ability to change here

Do the work 

Possibilities I just fade here

Do the work

Composition created for a gain here

Do the work

Repositioned to reframe here

Do the work

Compilation of a gift that can’t stay here

Do the work 

Brooklyn is the center of my apple

I was raised here

To do the work

I have to make sure I maintain here

To do this work

Opposition is paved here

Do the work 

Even with this disease I’ve gained here

Do the work

Presenting the unpresentable

I should be on my game here

Do the work

A woman grew in Brooklyn, I’m a create my name here

Do the work

Spreading love the Brooklyn way is why I stay here

Do the work 

first night

That first night

I didn't know what to expect
So I was prepared for nothing
Not for a second did I regret 
My choice at loving

The first time I was awoken by your cries
I could barely open my eyes and within that second I realized

I'd love you this second, I'd love you the next minute
forever and ever your mom I would be

Drenched in fear that this would be an almost every night thing in the upcoming months and a flash of doubt clouded my mind. How could I get through it and was I that strong?

The pain etched across my belly within the staples holding it together making getting up hard but giving up not an option.

I looked longingly in your face and stayed quiet during your constant mews worried you would feel the breathe you took away from me

Already charming and ambitious knowing what you want and I sit here and struggle to comprehend how I was entrusted with such a precious gift, how he who gives me glory will give me the strength, how he who guides me will lift me and those around me will lift her and his village will raise this child.

I feel guilty getting sleep and asking for you to be in the nursery, not resting from worry in the time you are away. Is this why parenthood feels like only wanting the best but not knowing how to give it? Oh shit it's only day 1.

- [ ] 1st night

cry out

When I heard you cry for the first time everything else ceased to exist, but that animalistic cry of freedom that was born from your lips.

Everything moved in slow motion until you were placed in my arms. You don't know yet you were my lifesaver
a reason to be calm after life's storms

A reason to think about everything but me
A reason for me to continue to be the best I can be

A reason to work harder and not needing to prove a point

A reason to love, a reason to talk it slow
A reason to reevaluate everything I've known

A reason for life, a reason to see
That though I have goals of success the best things in life are free
A reason to embody all I can be.

You are my gift from god
My heart, my Riley

stumble upon

My thoughts capsized by the raging sea of doubt
Screaming but no one can hear me out
The abundance of my feelings
Stuck as I hit the glass ceiling

Seeking to hide
Power to divide
From the endless, restlessness of my soul

I was whole but now im torn apart
Beginning to end and ending to start

I breath as the consciousness of my being
spills out in wisp of a foreign content
Leading me to responses
I never wanted to hear

I am here, but only in spirit
My body, now i fear it
Too close but so far that no one can hear it

I scream
because even in my dreams it is present
Signs of a peasant because my value has been weakened
I no longer know what im seeking
just that i have not found it yet

Or that safety net that hold me up when I have faltered
How I long for
Someone to keep my head above water
I can't do it alone
My heart beats on its own

And yet answers still elude me
Like the partner I cant find to sooth me
I continue on alone..........

The cycle

 take umbrage as a offended black

Pardon me
A
Afro-American pardon me
a
African-American pardon me
a
Negro pardon me
a
colored pardon me
a
house nigger pardon me
a
field nigger pardon me
a
slave pardon me
a
Inanimate object for recreational and systematic injustice pardon me
a
part of a tribe that will never be discovered
a

Fuck this no pardon me

I remember the first thought that stuck to my brain...
I was 5. I was taught that I needed to understand I already had 2 strikes against me:

1. I was African-American
2. I was female

The other strike that should of placed me out was sickle cell anemia but we have more important things to discuss right now

I grew up in Bed-Stuy during the "War on drugs" era better known as the 80's crack epidemic. I used to think those vials that visually captured my mind with those tops in rainbow colors were things left by others for me to play with.

I witnessed the drug and alcohol abuse that went rampant amongst citizens behind closed doors. Not knowing or understanding til later(when I became a criminologist/social worker) it was another form of self medicating to not live life.

I witnessed the war on poverty dismantling neighborhoods, not caring about certain neighborhoods, the beginnings of explointing neighborhoods

I witnessed the struggles of the project life, food stamps and food pantries with that rock solid ass cheese, and white labeled cans.

I witnessed when violence became death, drugs becmae territorial war, color war, pit us against WAR.....

I witnessed the deprecation of the African-American woman, the demeaning and cruel aspects of being free but being a slave to man so not being free....but being free but having to give up my thought process to sooth your thoughts and make you my world

now you wonder why all women want to be independent and non dependent, non-conforming and lead their dreams onward...it's okay you can keep assautling our hopes and dreams and the barriers we took to
and the reason we the most educated persons in this land as they see.....racism wasnt the only thing systematic

I witness the breakdown of the nuclear family

I witnessed the role of Rockefeller continuing to breakdown the nuclear family

I witnessed the take down of all the proud negros who had struggle to succeed in a free world
have that free world create systems
so in that free world they could struggle and never be free

I witness currently the repurcussions of leaving rehabilitation for incapacitation (I studied criminology for a reason)

I witness the lost of rights guarenteed as a USA citizen being stipped for mistakes made so the people most angry can't vote, cant live in public housing you take my money for, cant get a job, cant get a life....go back to what got me locked up in the 1st place...

A whole new class of degenerates right...

Whoa....

SYTEMS OVERLOAD MUST REBOOT

I witnessed incarcerated individuals having the ability to learn and better themselves stripped away because violence needs to be in cycles or the prison business will be in peril

I witness families destroyed by housing 85%of NYC residents in upstate counties so they can garner more money on their census while we get programs cut and taken away...ahh that cycle again

I witness the hurt and loss and pain when you cant afford or have the means to travel 8hrs for a visit

I witnessed the creation of gangs to combat systems
only to be remade to kill their own systems only to be raised to "kill each system, we need praise..
honor and ego is all we have in this game" cycling the violence in systems

These waters run deep and if we can't open our eyes to see what has led us here and what has got us here...we still that african leading others to our villiage cuz we want to show them love. ..

society makes us trust no one

Now we trust no one

I know what prison looks like...it's a shame almost every other black kid lives this life

I witnessed the policies deepen to hurt
Society deepen to change
Societal measures that have created this game

Let the niggers kill each other
on play and repeat

I witness rascism...the snide comments,
the looks and stares when i accompany a white family or friends

I witnessed that shotgun barrel on my head saying niggas aint welcome in North Carolina

I witnessed being chased off of blocks that said there is no room for niggers here on ave L

I remember being indentured and servants and i get angry and mad

Because you rather question me on what is bad and what we have and not wanting to take a look back

because your bubble allows you to not really feel so bad
or feel so sad
Just a smirk and a relief of glad....

(we cant be trusted still..right)

And when they can ...I got a resolution

I witnessed man...
THESE TIMES ARE ABOMINATIONS
But you still can't what see what im witnessing man...
what i see in front of me witnessing

Damn

When does it stop

Learn the appropriation and desecration of a culture locked up in systematic and institutionalized rascism before you try to take cover

I grew up here...
you think you know but have no idea

Dont ask why im angry

ASK WHY IM ANGRY

TRY TO FIGURE OUT WHY IM ANGRY

If you say nothing your just as guilty

This world for you may have have been rainbows and unicorns but for me

Its always been crazy....

I could be mad

could be mad

I was born with imperfections

Sickle cell anemia ravaging a body just born

I could be mad

Set up for failure through watching addictions, taking on addictions, fighting addictions

I could be mad

Physical abuse...the brutal Beatings, emotional abuse

mantra’d on you ain’t never gonna be shit

I could be mad

Left on my own while you follow another mans rule

I could be mad

By myself trying to figure out my same trying to figure out my brain

Losing those I grew close to

I could be mad

Friends turning on me

Behavior is well taught

I damn near always fought

For a color designed in separation

I could be mad

Paying my own way through college

The rates are hunting me down

Flag at half stance cuz these loans is cutting me down

Wounded with the bullet holes of knowledge just shoving me down

I thought I was spose to be a queen but these taxes is shutting me down

Equipped with the cycle of nonsense 

Keeps putting me down

I could be mad

I’ll fitting in my skin

My body full of sin

Trying to grasp the soul of within

Faltering not knowing where to begin

Again

I could be mad

Super saver

Bad behavior

I listen to you and you just ignore this neighbor

Feel as if you have caused this behavior

Friends are not friends when they don’t stop to ask why you insist on this behavior

I could be mad

At the abandonment by all

It’s about you when you call

Don’t give a fuck about me at all

I could be mad

I helped you out the pinch

I helped reformulate your shit

Only to get ditched and not be a part of forever

I could be mad

I float in a sea of aloneness

Try to pay with my atoning

I feel as if those closest to me are throwing the first stones in

I could be mad

Job that disrespected me

Even with my trajectory

Made me focus on monetary ecstasy 

Ripped my heart out the chest of me

Couldn’t acknowledge the birth of the best of me

Cuz I was too focused on the requirements of a job I now know wouldn’t stand for me

Lightweight from the fight that neglected me

Unresolved in my feelings of security

Can I appreciate my giving of everything

A baby grr inside me

I could be mad

I am fighting a war within my self but this post is partum

I’m fighting a body that kills my health

But these words ain’t hollow

I cry in the shower so my hopes can wash off

No one to push me so my dreams are far off

Regulated to the pain

I just need to sound off

The emotional turmoil in my brain 

Leaves me to shy off

I could be mad

 My tenacity is lost

My motivation was lost

There is no way for recourse

Abandonment daily reforced

I could be mad

Not a part of your life

I could be mad

Feeling like a single mother

All this new stuff to discover

Forcing my body and mind to move in ways I can’t uncover

I’m tired

I could be mad

Feeling oh so alone and all those people who used to utilize me for everything life is just carrying on

Enjoy

I could be mad

No vocal approachments 

No reaction to hopelessness

I’m lost and approaching

This is my life

I could be mad 

But Riley is beautiful

- [ ]