Trayvon's Scream

Everyday and every night some black or brown child will slip through the cracks of this world… disappear… meet with a violent event that

stops his heart…

that steals his breath

… that ends his life.

And there will be silence.

* * * * * *

Who really screamed that rainy Florida night?

I believe it was Trayvon Martin.

I believe it was his mother.

I believe it was another faceless,

Nameless victim of America’s

Injustice.

Who really screamed that rainy Florida evening…?

I believe it was a chorus of my ancestors. It was

Emmet Till’s scream…

And Abner Louima’s

And Yusef Hawkins’…and

Michael Griffith’s…

And Michael Stewart's

And Eleanor Bumpers’

And Oscar Grant’s…and

Ramarley Graham’s…

I believe it was Trayvon Martin’s scream

Knowing

His right to a life of Liberty was

A cause too small to hear

And too meaningless to process…

His Life was just

A scream to be ignored or

Crushed

Like a beetle upon concrete.

And now. . .

Who will scream for all of them?

And who will scream for him

If not us…

If not me, a lone poet who knows nothing

About the pain or velocity of a bullet

To the chest?

All I know for sure is this:

Justice is a blind bitch that doesn’t give a shit about us.

It just continuously breaks my heart that we must live like this!

It just continuously breaks my heart that we must die like this!

The saddest reality of all is this:

Justice is a blind, cold-hearted bitch, that doesn’t

Give a shit

About us.

One.

Copyright© 2013 By L.M. Ross

All Rights Reserved without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above. No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in or reintroduced in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without prior written permission from the author, except brief quotes used in reviews.

Endangered At 17: Poem For Trayvon Martin

I remember being 17, living on Lays
Potato chips, chili dogs and Wonder bread…
Would never be caught dead
Or seen without
My Swedish knits and
Chuck Taylors… with Stevie
Wonder blasting Superstition
In my head. I remember

Playing Spades, and scratching myself in
“Nasty” places, full of raging
Hormones, adrenaline and
Silent fear. I remember how it feels

To live in Black skin. Being told
By my mother, I was “beautiful.”
Being told by teachers, I was “Artistic”
And yes even “Gifted…” but
Never once told I was invincible. I remember this
As surely as I recall walking
Home from the movies, at night, and

Being stopped by local cops
Because I fit the descript
Of some hot-
Wired black boy who might just
Explode… who
Was up to some no good,
Criminally-minded shit,
When it was neither my behavior,
My nature,
Nor my actions but
The color of my skin which
Dictated this.

I remember feeling diminished, and
Embittered, enraged,
And endangered for the first time
At age 17... when I should have felt
Young and wild and free
And full of possibilities… Like you,

Trayvon… Angelic-faced manchild
Of a brown-skin hue. Almost
Brand new in the world,
Caught up inside that swirl of
Confusion... and yet
Another senseless
Victim to the paranoia of
Another racist fool.




Did you fit that tragic
Descript too, Trayvon?
Hoodie-clad and armed with
Skittles and iced tea? How dangerous!



How deadly
You must be. How deadly!
How..? Deadly?

How dead.








One.





© 2012 by L.M.Ross moaningmanblues All Rights Reserved