{"id":176443234,"date":"2014-09-18T04:08:20","date_gmt":"2014-09-18T09:08:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/?p=176443234"},"modified":"2014-09-18T04:08:20","modified_gmt":"2014-09-18T09:08:20","slug":"poetry-we-was-red-before-they-called-us-black-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/2014\/09\/18\/poetry-we-was-red-before-they-called-us-black-3\/","title":{"rendered":"POETRY: WE WAS RED BEFORE THEY CALLED US BLACK"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\"photo<\/a>

photo by Alex Lear<\/strong><\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

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WE WAS RED <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

BEFORE THEY CALLED US BLACK<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We was red before Marx gave a color<\/span><\/p>\n

to sharing (which<\/span><\/p>\n

after all, we did all the time<\/span><\/p>\n

before we became acquainted with snow<\/span><\/p>\n

and learned to look at a machine<\/span><\/p>\n

to tell us what time it was, some of us<\/span><\/p>\n

even carry clocks in our teeth<\/span><\/p>\n

and get a toothache<\/span><\/p>\n

every time the opportunity to escape<\/span><\/p>\n

presents itself<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

it is so boring becoming white<\/span><\/p>\n

all you got to do is do the same shit<\/span><\/p>\n

over and over again<\/span><\/p>\n

try to be god<\/span><\/p>\n

fuck over women<\/span><\/p>\n

and vainly conspire to chain the weather<\/span><\/p>\n

over and over<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I know you think this poem is crazy<\/span><\/p>\n

but that\u2019s only because<\/span><\/p>\n

you\u2019re a capitalist<\/span><\/p>\n

and hate anything red, not to mention<\/span><\/p>\n

if it\u2019s black and riffing<\/span><\/p>\n

about peace and freedom<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

no, I didn\u2019t get this from Marx<\/span><\/p>\n

Marx got the idea<\/span><\/p>\n

of sharing from us<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

you don\u2019t believe me, ask<\/span><\/p>\n

Engles who the first humans was<\/span><\/p>\n

and how they used to live<\/span><\/p>\n

a long time before<\/span><\/p>\n

the calendar<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

how do you think people kept track<\/span><\/p>\n

of what time it was twenty thousand years ago<\/span><\/p>\n

I bet you they survived<\/span><\/p>\n

I bet you they had children<\/span><\/p>\n

lived, loved, laughed and cried<\/span><\/p>\n

I bet you they weren\u2019t late for work<\/span><\/p>\n

or worried about the midnight tax deadline<\/span><\/p>\n

in the middle of April\u2014taxes? What is that<\/span><\/p>\n

some form of devil worship, of paying tribute<\/span><\/p>\n

to the great-great grandchildren of terrorists?<\/span><\/p>\n

I bet you long time ago women still had their<\/span><\/p>\n

periods regular without having to take Tylenol<\/span><\/p>\n

for three days straight, and we didn\u2019t<\/span><\/p>\n

have to wonder what to do with trash<\/span><\/p>\n

that wouldn\u2019t disappear if you buried it or<\/span><\/p>\n

what time the church service was or<\/span><\/p>\n

leaving work late to avoid the rush hour traffic<\/span><\/p>\n

or none of that<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I bet you they didn\u2019t worry about the stock market crashing<\/span><\/p>\n

or paying the mortgage\u2014mortgage? A strange word, mort =<\/span><\/p>\n

death, gage = pledge, what are we pledging<\/span><\/p>\n

to pay back some money or die trying, I know<\/span><\/p>\n

most of yall believe in progress<\/span><\/p>\n

believe we know more than people did ten thousand years ago<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I bet you think a cell phone and a computer prove<\/span><\/p>\n

that we better off than natives was in Africa even two<\/span><\/p>\n

thousand years ago<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Ok, here\u2019s one for you, there were at least 12 Egyptian dynasties<\/span><\/p>\n

each one at least four or five hundred years long, how much<\/span><\/p>\n

longer you think America going to be around<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll give you a few moments to think about that<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Opps, time\u2019s up\u2026)<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014kalamu ya salaam<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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        WE WAS RED BEFORE THEY CALLED US BLACK \u00a0 We was red before Marx gave a color to sharing (which after all, we did all the time before we became acquainted with snow and learned to look at a machine to tell us what time it was, some of us even […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","_s2mail":"yes"},"categories":[6],"tags":[4,12,11],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176443234"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176443234"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176443234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":176443236,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176443234\/revisions\/176443236"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176443234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176443234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kalamu.com\/neogriot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176443234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}