I’m not a master drummer I drum to the Master The master crafter push us through the disaster The beat gets up the asses of slackers Rappers pastors and gang banger blasters Beat the drum because the times is drastic My lyrics sparkle spastic lean and elastic Beat the drum fears melt like plastic Beat the drum and dance is […]
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The Night Clouds Ate the Moon Strange May night chill breeze gray black clouds rush in black above And beyond. Faster than ever before. The earth warming chill night, sky Boiling froth of clouds drawn to Messenger moon speaking sun codes To moaning earth. Is it labor or death? Labor or death… or both birthing Children of dust and storm […]
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(For Deborah Ann Powell on our 22nd Marriage Anniversary) blessed groove of days as good as music melodies rhythms riffing relentlessly in pressing drive of will to live and love working it out baby gots to keep working it out. fussing cacophony and savored pillow talk and inspirations flavors the flow of you and I, 22 years into the groove […]
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Son, raise up your head Child raise up our head Though this old world Full of killing and dread Remember child what Jesus said Don’t gain the world and lose your soul Pray and press so hope takes hold Son raise up Your head Son don’t let nothing turn you around Child don’t let nobody turn you around Though wicked […]
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I walked the overnight crying baby shifts Changed diapers wipes baby shit and vomit Off ruined shirts never to be worn again Carried the babies, little heads bouncing off chest In journeys through city adventures Stuck bottles of pumped breast milk in puckering lips So often that Jon at thirteen says mom I mean dad And even the college boy […]
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Mother’s Day in Summer’s Snow As those last memories Of those emaciated words Your life’s summation sowed As umbilical legacy into mine Your first born: I’ll be alright After a while. And you knew this By faith and not by sight That like dandelion sprinkling Seed as white as the cotton You picked as a little girl Sickly in the […]
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i hear in peace of sleeping winds in the dark stillness i hear hymn of the waters stormy waters wood hull creaking underneath snap of whips beat of blood dripping torrent of tears sky crying funereal moans spirits screaming beneath hull and from deep waters and I hear the call from distant east prayer shouts ancestral tongues beacon light touching […]
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Duet #13: Deeper The kisses go deeper and deeper and deeper The bliss’s go deeper and deeper and deeper I love you in a deeper place than superficial flesh I love the way our soul flow keeps the life journey fresh Sweet fusion and communion cause explosions to the touch The years and path we’ve traveled keep the loving nights […]
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Broken Legacy Dedicated to John Coltrane Do the bruised brass wailing exclamation scar of history/ suffocating in shadows of projects spread like southern crosses burning/ fall futilely on depressed ears of spiritually deaf/ Do harsh sharp horn shouting preachments sustain chanted sermons to empty pews/Do anyone still listen to John Coltrane laying dead buried in our Black blue souls/sax projected […]
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Lyric for My Sons (I write to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God lives in you, and you have overcome the evil one. 1 John 2:14) The poetry of your birth cries Revelatory connect of our eyes Caused Grandma Joetta to sigh From Blood River you rise Move my emotions to devotion Birth inspires […]
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