SYSTEMATIC
swinging in
between coffee
breaks and
women’s skirts,
dressed to
beg for
success.
succumbing to
a government
that will
wear the garb
of freedom,
but have
stretch marks
in between
wrinkles that
signal
the nature
of capitalism.
america was built
by slaves,
with slanted eyes,
with different
religions,
with black skin,
with unknown
languages.
this
melting pot
mentality feeds
the white
moderate,
that their
employer
isn’t racist and
that “my town
just lacks diversity.”
its between
packing for a
trip to cabo on the
upper east side
of manhattan
and SLANGING
in south central.
we contrast
lifestyles
by comparing
incomes,
housing,
race,
religion,
gender,
legal status,
the key
that slips
into the soles
of our workboots,
that slip into
the callouses
of our rugged,
dirt-beat hands,
fragile with the
fruit of the rich.
with the food
of the one’s who
can afford it.
a vase is
something
beautiful to look
at, after the price
tag slips under our
nose prompting
faces of worry,
“we can’t decorate,
we have no money.”
we are the
children of
the parents
who sleep with
scholarship
foundations,
grant money
tucked under
our mattress
so the looming
debt of loans
will never cross
our paths or
harrowingly
follow us like an
angel’s halo.
we believe that
saviors, goddesses
live inside of our
mothers, the
ones who’s
5 am is ripping
roots out the ground
instead of sleeping.
we pleaded
against the
manifestation
of eviction,
of foreclosure,
of bankruptcy,
of taxes,
of police
knocking down
the door
of our brown
family;
too kind to
protest because
“it is the law, y’know.”
About the Contributor