Bury Me Beneath the Killin' Fields

2006
When my heart stops pumping blood
When my breath quits and I know that it’s real
Don’t carry me a-top majestic mountains
Bury me 'neath the killin’ fields

Bury me, oh bury me
Bury me, Lord, Lord bury me
Lay my soul, lay my pride where my people fought and died
Bury me beneath the killin’ fields

When my eyes fade away
When my spirit leaves and all my sins revealed
When the funeral fire gets done burnin’
Bury me beneath the killing fields

When my days don’t come no more, death comes knocking at my door
Bury me beneath the killing fields
When you hear the death bells roar from a politician’s war
Bury me beneath the killing fields
When my voice no longer sounds and my families gather ‘round
Bury me beneath the killing fields
When my heart no longer pounds and the reaper’s coming down
Bury me beneath the killing fields
Where my people lived as slaves came and left without no name
Bury me beneath the killing fields
With the warriors that came, lived and died upon them plains, won't you
Bury me beneath the killing fields

You Remind Me of a Girl I Knew

You remind me of a girl I knew
Whose hair was dark and eyes were blue
Who made me feel like someone new
Each time I saw her face

You remind me of a girl I knew
When I was young and went to school
Whose voice did carry soft and true
Her lips my fingers traced

You remind me of a girl I knew
Who saw the light where angels flew
Whom into lovely woman grew
Whose skin my mouth did taste

You remind me of a girl I knew
Who made my wildest dreams come true
Who reached below and pulled me through
Her memory I embrace

You remind me of a girl I knew.

Placenta

January 31, 2006


Born of earth and seeded soil
Return my flesh into the ground
From whence I was created

On a grey September afternoon, 12:03 to be exact, out came a confused 1980 from my mother’s womb. Inside an apartment on First Avenue, my mother expelled me from her belly with the aid of midwives. My useless and frantic father repeating, “I’m sorry…I didn’t mean to cause you this pain,” tears in his eyes, my mother responding
“Would you shut-up! You’re not helping me!” amidst the gathering of curious neighbor friends and some of their children. Blankets were wrapped around the shivering (me) and I was cleaned of fetal membranes and amniotic fluids, silent and sudden.
My mother, being of the holistic and Eastern medicine philosophy (hence the at-home delivery), decided that she was going to bury my, or, her, no, our placenta into the ground, from which it came. The Minnesota winds, however, were hard that year and the ground was already far too hard to dig up and frost looked into our windows. Mom decided to do what anybody faced with the dilemma of burying a placenta in impenetrable soil would do: she put it in a plastic baggie and stored it in a freezer until the ground was soft again.

Born of earth and seeded soil
Return my flesh into the ground
From whence I was created

Winter passed through Minneapolis and the vegetation unfolded slowly under the pale sun. The birds sang and shook the branches they jumped to and from, the neighborhood dogs sniffed each other in parks and a warm breeze rolled the empty bottles down the gutter sounding like whiskey wind chimes. It was placenta time.
The opaque freezer bag was removed and placed on a windowsill like some twisted version of mama’s home cooked blueberry pie, to thaw in the sun. A spot was picked; a hole was dug. When my mother returned for the afterbirth, it was no longer there. A quick investigation lead to the neighbor’s dog Sophie. Sophie was 50% German shepherd, 50% wolf and 100% gnawing on my placenta.
Sophie made it clear that we could fight her for the meat-patty, but one way or another she was going to have meat in her teeth. After a quick standoff, all attempts to retrieve the amniotic sack were aborted and Sophie trotted off into the sunset to finish her treat.

Born of earth and seeded soil
Return my flesh into the ground
The ground from whence it came

Ninja in a Hotel Room

The look on Rhonda’s face was priceless as she opened the door to room 515, only to find me poised in attack position, wearing only my black Hanes boxer/briefs and the black wrinkled t-shirt I slept in.
“Oh my God! Y’all checked in already?! Look at me opening doors an’ you in a karate stance…I’m so sorry…”
I decided to spare Rhonda’s life, and simply shut the door with a certain grace that only a true ninja could apply after an intruder has entered his domicile.

Half-Breed Boy

October 4th , 2007

I asked my father late one night why I don’t look like him
He looked right through me, to his glass, and filled it to the brim
I asked my mother bright one day, why I ain’t dark like her
She lied right through her golden smile and said she wasn’t sure

My sister she has skin like soil, brother’s dark as night
Grandma scolds them every day and sends them from her sight
Grandma tells me I’m the best one but I can’t do nothin’ right
She treats me like the white folks that she worked for all her life

I asked my father while we walked, why I don’t look like him
He told me we’re all different but our kinship is within
I asked my mother why I’m white, why I don’t have her skin
She cried into her weathered hands and walked into the wind

My sister she has skin like soil, brother’s dark as night
Grandma beats them, calls them names and tells them they ain’t right
Grandma tells me I’m the good one but I’m weakest of the three
I wish Grandpa was still here, cause he’d tell me what he sees