My wings would be a mosaic
made of black mothers’ pride
They’d be boomboxes for justice
Amplifying the riot in our souls
They’d be instruments
Of destruction
Burning monuments to make room for equal testaments
They’d evolve into the freedom to live unaccosted and to die avenged
They’d be bullet proof
and resistant to hate
They’d span from the Middle Passage to Miami
They’d lift our heavy hearts
and their downward thrust
Would scatter the white ashes
of false supremacy
~Rahk
First, I must thank everyone who has taken a moment out of your day to read a poem. Poems need people to breathe and the poems on Rahk’s Water are grateful for lending your voice to these silent words. Whether you read them silently or aloud, your voice and mine merge in these moments and it is intimate.
You may or may not have noticed a significant decline in posts since December. Much of this is due to the increased challenges posed by Covid, and the rest is because I have started a web series entitled RahkReads on IGTV. In the spirit of #ReadMorePoetry, RahkReads so far is just a man and his poems. However, I am very excited that tomorrow’s webisode will include readings from the late Assotto Saint and the incomparable Saul Williams. I hope you tune in, like, save, or share.
Follow the series on Instagram at @RahkReads
I just want to go for a swiiiimmmm
After a bath in the sun
Mango Wheat Orange Moon
Wide palms praising the One
Who knows the count of the sand
& cowrote my Mama’s Gun
Booming Bluetooth speaker
Conversating on . . . & on
As the sweat drop-glistens
Orange Moon drops gone
Seashells beneath brown feet
Seagulls eyeing my phone
Wooooosh, a flirty breeze
Guides us to the shore
Woooooo this ocean’s crisp
Won’t be sweating no more
A tight hug to the sea
Ain’t no stress to report
Oh wait, ’tis the season for Covid
& The Cost of Living’s the resort
~Rahk.
Shout out to my art ma [in my head] Erykah Badu.
1.
You say you love me
(For the Bible tells you so)
You say you love me
(For you are a child of God)
You insist you love me
But your love hits like hurled stones
But your love stabs sole of foot
It’s hard to walk
It hurts to walk
When your love vehemently rejects my shared need to breathe
2.
Such a peculiar love to offer sour fruit to starving children
Then stand repulsed, willfully withholding aid, when their bodies inevitably protest
How have you not choked on all the dust your love collects?
~Rahk.
I voted for fear
of who this nation is
and has been
The kumbaya of all lives
does not equal freedom
does not equal justice
does not defund the system
functioning as a de factor spine
for the privileged
I voted out of necessity
because this country
has never lived up to its foundation
still handling colored cloth with more care
than colored children
~Rahk.
Tell yourself. Tell yourself
That giving up is an option,
But not for someone as unicorn as you
So spread those effervescent wings
Let their sparkle brush bold colors across the sky
And the people will shout aurora
As you pass by
On hooves of crayola clouds
Tell yourself that you are a marvel
That what your flesh cannot mend
Your spirit must renew
For you are a marvel
And no storm can triumph over your will
For you silence thunder with your smile
And tickle lightning with your lashes
Your holy locs congress the wind
Tell yourself that you are God’s
That you belong to the love that begat your sense of self
Gather yourself, gather yourself
And stand on that makeshift stage within
Face your phobia of public speech
Speak your truth across that mic
And stir the selves you’ve gathered
Until their fragrance speaks as the holy spirit
Then tell yourself to be okay
With not being okay sometimes
Because at all times, life demands integrity
To thine own self be true
To thine own self be true
And then there’s no mirror that can haunt you
And then there’s no slander that can slay your legacy
And then there’s no reason to doubt
That you are no prisoner
Though your wrists may be rubbed raw
That you are no martyr
Though you have died one hundred gruesome deaths
That you are no villain
Though you wear a patriotic badge of civil disobedience
Tell yourself
Tell yourself
That freedom is not a gift to be given
But a revelation that freedom is and always has been yours
And at any time
As a free agent
You can choose revolution
And rewrite the constitution of your independence.
Tell yourself, tell yourself
That you are a new testament of faith
That douses tortured crosses
With the antisemetic tears of arsonists
For every devil weeps
When its hate is stilled
By the hopes you tell yourself
For every devil burns unholy and red
When its blasphemy does not lower your head in deference to any man’s hate
To glare it in the eyes as a colleague of hate
Tell yourself its not too late
Tell yourself its not too late
To breathe
~Rahk
Revised for clarity in November 5, 2021.
Revised for clarity on November 9, 2020.
What can a man know of God
If he knows nothing of repentance?
What can a man know of repentance
If he knows nothing of a woman’s right to choose?
What can a man know of a woman’s right
If he does not witness softness as kin?
If he does not witness softness in men
If he does not witness often within
that strength of spirit overtakes strength of arms
Even chosen kings are not above writing Psalms
~Rahk.
I looked in mirrors deep- Found myself in cobwebbed enemies, I held my hand out in admiration. Of their colors. Of their authenticity. I am not whole without them. They are the pure part of this body, They are the basement voices, The ones that I keep in mind- When I find too much sky, […]
Attic.
The latest poem from one of my favorite poets: Allantra Lewis.
Looking back
the questions I had
were more a proclamation
of autonomous
maleness
More affirmative
than outcries of “Punk!”
More nurturing than
“Hold it in. You bet’ not cry”
when you withstand hit after hit
when your body
is a faucet and an
unsuspecting wall
built to withstand hit after hit
My questions were less interrogative
than sexual inquiries
and voyeuristic requests
to witness bedroom theatrics
Less deviant than conquest
Not as fearful as religion
Inconsequential to pink polos
and Mariah Carey in headphones
Innocence does not master sports
nor does it demand a wide stride
or pants that give in to gravity
Self-awareness counts
the notches in chastity belts
Looking forward
the answer is far more curious
than wandering eyes –
Here be the island
which nurtures life
I’ll build here
with questions shifting my shore
~Rahk.
you’ve spent your life
giving in
life runs out
change does not
empty your pockets
Rahk
1. It’s ashamed these businesses just reopened
And now they have to pay for damages
Yeah, Philip said his shop looks like a skull, all shadows and caverns.
And daddy always told us that floor-to-ceiling windows catch the eye…
I told Philip he should have chosen that other location…
2. Lord, have mercy! Why is this still happening?
I don’t know, bae, but it’s got to stop, it’s got to stop.
But how can it when this country is rich with graves,
smoothie shops as tomb stones?
3. I did not march with a million men for this.
I did not withstand hosed tsunamis for this.
I do not carry the teeth marks of Officer K9 for this to still be America.
4. What are they protesting? People die all the time.
But at the knee of police? But unarmed?
Well yeah, sure. They can’t all be black.
And are any of them white?
Who knows? But those police officers certainly aren’t black.
I suppose you’re right, but what can we do?
Yeah…this is America.
Yeah, this is America.
I’ve seen the back of heads and asses switch to a goodbye beat too many times to count.
Said farewell in every language except happiness and left tears smudged on so many doorknobs I’ve lost count in the aftermath and still, I let you in.
Let you stop on the stoop, drag your feet across the plain old mat to keep from dragging grass across the carpet, and eventually, I’ll see those same feet dashing in the other direction, and it’s so depressing.
Still, I let you in. Still, I offer you a cool drink of water, or something stronger, but you’re never up for it. I sip alone.
Maybe these spirits won’t haunt your footsteps in the morning or the evening or the yesteryear I’ve come to live with…
The parts of self we smother
To keep silent
So that we are not falsely accused
Of over-reaction
So that we are not falsely accused
Of being
“Soft”
So that we are not falsely accused
Of (un)professionalism
Of protest
So that we are not falsely accused
Of inserting an “I” where “I” does not belong
As if I, as if we, don’t belong in front of feelings
As if I, as if we, don’t feel
The phantom knee on my, on our, necks
The parts of self that hold tight to our chest
That clench almost painfully behind closed lips
The parts that resent us for pressing the pillow exactly where other parts asked the pillow to be pressed
The parts that never run out of breath, that don’t submit to the attempt to suppress, even when breath falters
The parts that care nothing of status quo and take sustenance from passive resistance
The parts that cry out, that raise up, that stand proud, that hold firm
The parts that find air to breathe despite the knee
Those parts understand
They understand that sytemic silence is not survival
But acceptance
~Rahk.
They taught me that poems shakespeare into sonnets.
Piercing the present so William keeps living on
’cause we study his writing as if no other
art has been written. Shakespeare is dead but they still
won’t kill him. Or let him die. Worshipping his words,
they grant him eternal life. The skin of his voice,
a representation of White. He lives so free
on American soil. Immigrants in our art.
No wall was ever proposed for dead citizens
smuggled into the nation by the well-to-do.
I’m reforming the sonnet. Shakespeare needs rest, too.
He speaks no more. Writes even less ’bout much ado.
Silencing dead voices- my “taming of the shrew”.
Silencing dead voices- my “taming of the shrew”.
Go to Baptism Lake
Sit on the water, take a seat
Dip your feet
That hand on your scarred back
Is an inquisitive wind
That coolness is the sin of your obedience washing away
That warmth is praise for your skin
That sunlight is not a whip
That bird song is not an alarm
That splash might be a tear
But that’s okay, it’s okay
Rest does not require strong arms
~Rahk.
Rahk's Water 