Two Poems
one about radiation, the other about sentient water, still in their draft stages but wanted to share
Radiation is much like debt
Many humans experience small amounts of it, and
if our resources and health allow, we will die having suffered from as little of it as possible
cat scans can discover a budding tumor, yet surveillance swells within the belly of amerikkka as a result of the war on terror
I have become disillusioned with the accomplishments of science and technology at the expense of malicious intent
the suffering untold and unseen.
Darwinism assigns prisoners whose value is equivalent to what or who you could master
ground zero marked graves for black soldiers buried with denied VA benefits
denied access to the better half of radiation’s purpose
I travel back in time to when every cell in my body is linked to apathy and hate
To the point where even my offspring would not have a fair trial at life
unveiled as a victim of abandonment, uranium poisons my womb
I suppose I’d only be upset had I already had their names picked out
The tools used on me had proper nouns while I,
someone breathing, panting, pleading,
Was not granted such privileges as consent or value behind a name
Nuance makes her bed in the place I wanted to experience love for a third time,
The first two didn’t work out
I won’t live past 30 because of the nobel peace prize,
My bloodline will stop at me because of the Times Person of the Year
I’ll have a conversation with god and he’ll tell me I would have met the love of my life at 31
I would beat the odds and have three children I would have to try hard to keep out of trouble
Instead my body will decompose into the soil,
Dirt cannot probe and prod, instead, it swallows and absorbs
Atoms will be reduced to as close to nothing as they can get
my radioactive corpse will go from the lab to the grave
Uranium has a half-life of 4 billion years. I would have called it a success to make it to 65
I am upset that the world’s wonders cannot produce awe in the same way god does
Or is god the one to blame for this all
My anger dies with me, I pray my ideas don’t.
Radiation mocks what’s left of me with breaths under soil I will be buried in, or robs me of warm, summer breezes as it is released into the air upon my incineration
if waters were sentient they would be wrecked with guilt and grief for being an involuntary accomplice
Oceans have witnessed the middle passage,
Swallowing bodies of enslaved black people for marine insurance cashouts,
Drowning as resistance over subjugation
denied proper burial, severing their ties with their land
sharks play grim reapers, death trailing slave ships as a newfound habit
The bottom of the sea is black, undiscovered
The conscious sea makes the floor her alter,
adorned with remnants of ships, wreckage from wars, and rare signs of life beyond human comprehension
the pressure forms through absorbing ruins from corrupt humans
their sunken quests for power
They have changed her sculpting of lands into borders
land and black people’s commonalities include resistance to becoming property
However western intervention deemed worthiness determined by relationship to capital and
potential for profit
Labeled water fountains become early symbolism of power for impressionable children
whose parents will be rented an apartment with murky cold showers and abusive plumbing
because Jim Crow decided the validity of their lease,
Hurricanes expose faulty infrastructure, state negligence
Manufacturers of precarity fill their pools, observing suffering from a lawnchair
Their children mimick the tides showcasing talents of pissing while swimming
Drinking water is policy influenced,
Or repackaged, done up with unsightly typography
throats dry out in revolting prisoners
The ones freshly released under the illusion of freedom, use their chains to meet their ancestors at sea
There is your argument for incarceration as modern day slavery
Sinks have been puking for years, lapping terms of presidencies
Fresh springs, rivers, waterwalls become rewards of assimilation
absence of water codify domination and biopolitical warfare
If waters are sentient, they remember, they mourn
The rivers, seas, lakes, and even the insignificant puddles pray with each cycle we grow kinder
Baptisms will be the only reason a human places another person underwater
Children will be heard laughing, splashing from rubble-surrounded beaches
Storms will be a reason to gather under one roof, candles illuminating sacred faces, little love spells at the table
washing dishes evolved into a ritual, leaving the pans to soak overnight letting gratitude linger until morning
We are mostly water,
We means all life, and Earth itself too
There should not be this much control or grief over what a mother’s womb is made of
