“My hunch is that Sylvia Plath was not
Especially fun company. A drama queen, thin-skinned,
And skittery, she thought her poems were ordinary.”
Source: American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
“Possibly twilight makes blackness dangerous
Darkness. Probably all my encounters
Are existential jambalaya. Which is to say,
A nigga can survive. Something happened
In Sanford, something happened in Ferguson
And Brooklyn & Charleston, something happened
In Chicago & Cleveland & Baltimore & happens
Almost everywhere in this country every day.
Probably someone is prey in all of our encounters.
You won't admit it. The names alive are like the names
In graves.”
Source: American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
“Are you not the color of this country's current threat
Advisory?”
Source: American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
“Probably, ghosts are allergic to us. Our uproarious
Breathing & ruckus. Our eruptions, our disregard
For dust.”
Source: American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
“I live a life
That burns a hole through life, that leaves a scar for life,
That makes me weep for another life. Define life.”
Source: American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
“Probably all our encounters are existential
Jambalaya. Which is to say, can a nigga survive?”
Source: American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
“Glad someone shot deserved to be shot finally,
George Wallace. After you send your basket of balms
And berries for the girls the bomb buried in Birmingham,
After you add your palms to the psalms & palm covered
Caskets of the girls the bomb buried in Birmingham,
I’ll muster a pinch of prayer for you. You are the blind
Protagonist of a story that begins, “In my previous life
My work involved returning runaway slaves to slavery,”
And ends with the image of a black nurse pushing
Your old ass in a wheelchair. Can you guess what black
Folk passing empty cotton fields feel, George Wallace?
I damn you with the opposite of that feeling. I keep thinking
I’m confessing for the first time, the reason I fear you,
And you keep asking why I’m telling this old story again.”
Source: American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
“There is the happiness you have
And the happiness you deserve.”
Source: The Tradition
“When I kill me, I will
Do it the same way most Americans do,
I promise you: cigarette smoke
Or a piece of meat on which I choke
Or so broke I freeze
In one of these winters we keep
Calling worst. I promise if you hear
Of me dead anywhere near
A cop, then that cop killed me.”
Source: The Tradition
“Oh, the wondrous places through which I wander:
woodlands, meadows, and green hillsides yonder.
I hike over mossy, meandering paths.
Dead branches serve nicely as walking staffs.
The sunset paints scenery crimson and gold.
Oh, wondrous nature dyed in colors bold.”
Source: Being Bold: Quotes, Poetry, & Motivations for Every Day of the Year