Maisha Baton - Flight Time Sample Poems

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Flight Time - Sample Poems

A Very Honorable Mention

Coming from a long line of survivors
and writing these few lines
as if immortality was assured
(even for my children)
I mention here New Orleans
and the slave days of my father's fathers.
I mention here Frederick, Maryland
and my mother's mother
and her husband, struck dumb
at the cutting edges of reality.
afterwards mumbling justified paranoia
and curses at the world.

I mention here Little Ann
who was the daughter of Big Ann
and how she loved almost everybody;
living her years too quickly
in the absurdity of drunken streets
and crying in the midst of chaos;
rats eating at her reality and
roaches in the recesses of her walls.

I mention her grandson who loves her still
even in her perpetual quiet.

African Footprints

It was Pittsburgh in the 70's
and the world was a Black Happenin.
There was Black Bart and Diane's Heart
and the Ode To Ethiopia
done by us women.
It was Sweet Black in the Summer City
of Bubblin Brown Sugar and Chocolate Puddin
and all of it a happenin in Ebony.
There was Black Expressions of Truth
from almost everybody.
It was Little Willie by Rob Penny
and Black Bart by August Wilson
and Colored Girls
by some very colored ladies;
with jazz riding, once again,
the air waves of the city; "Comin at you."
and Diz wasn't really gone.
It was Wine Sellers sellin their thing
and Sweetback singin his Baddass song
and B.J. givin’ the Bitches their due
dancin a sure-nuf happenin
of American Fruit From African Roots
with titles of destruction.
It was Bearden and White
at the Black Arts Center
and Haitian artifacts on Solidarity Day.
It was Amir doin his poet thing,
JUST A BLOWIN IN THE WORD.
and nights keep right on burnin
and African Footprints, they

will never vanish from the earth.

Small Town Flashback

Small towns never really leave you.
They tuck themselves into your chest,
bury themselves just behind the heart,
and breathe
in and out with you.
Like the nagging voices of frustrated housewives,
in and out they breathe;
calling you home
after the eight o'clock street lights,
the unwelcome stars,
the pulsating tales of summer
told by postmen and drugstore clerks
from barber chairs and in beauty shops.
Always a trace in the blood;
Always a distant beating.

Small towns keloid even the most European of us.
They breathe in and out with you.
And some recall only the good parts
and some will not mention of them at all.