Short Harlem Poems

Written from black hands,
Innovative jazz poems:
Harlem renaissance....

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Joplin's Langston Hughes
drew words from jaz&blues
With verse incisive&folksey
is how Harlem sequence came to be...

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Harlem Globetrotters
most famous trotters
clowns of the court
and best of sport 
watching the game 
never the same
performers they are
they really gone far...

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The Globetrotters haven't had enough
Thrilling crowds with their magical stuff
Magic it was
Creating a buzz
A hoop at the bell was sure up to snuff...

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Spice
Spanish Harlem
 Tequila under sunset
Sweet/salty spice
Margarita
Sin
Tango
Salsa
I dipped my umbrella
Sweaty ambiance
Face flushed
Feel you
Peircing eyes
Desire
I dipped my umbrella...

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Iconic, late African-American poet, Langston Hughes. 
     Dropped "John Mercer" from name; paid his dues...

 As one of the leading voices in the Harlem Renaissance.
Poem, "Dream Deferred," deemed his piece de resistance.


Date posted: 07/28/2021...

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from Caribbean
queenie harlems queen of crime
ran the neighborhood

dressing to the nines
a civil rights activist
financial wizard

she taunted gangsters
to steal her territory
in newspaper ads

a gang war ensued
forty people were left dead
killer queen escaped...

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Red x trane 
(a black arts movement kwansaba)
by ‘bro.zayid’

Garvey greased Harlem struttin 
Baraka bluuuue New Ark floats
Chicago ‘sippi blood thick
Watts fire ibeji badd
Big Eazy polyrhythmic
Dee stroyed broadsided lovin
A red X’d Trane flyin home…

@2015 all rights reserved...

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Mother 
your name has you bind,
but is that the reason you are so kind?
not a selfish thought 
not a careless feeling
you mother are truely a wonderful being
made of soft spoken words
given to a child not even harlem deserves
blow to blow
you stand up 
weakness you never show 
mother you truely glow...

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Some are born Harlem Mercedes
and cast their shadow wide
Turn the world around
with love and peace
Sapple as a Jamaican Calypso
you rode the island Sun
and gave your generational heart
An Aladdin's legacy of activism
of civil rights with Martin King
and the antithesis of Bush and Trump
Wisdom as cultured Wine...

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Variations in c note
                                       On the scales arising nocturn 
                                   Bellows swing tapping onto Harlem 









                                              All rights reserved 
                                                 A.Camacho jr.
                                                   1996-2015...

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Me and my wife went to Harlem, New York 
We were stand-outs, and I looked like a dork 
An angry man with a knife 
Came up to me and my wife 
And he said... "do you know where to find me a fork" 

Sweating and shaking, I said, "I don't know... 
But if you want, I'll find one, let me go" 
He said. "okay, see you soon" 
I said, "I'll see you in June... 
Hold my wife, on my way...to Idaho" 


State Limerick Poetry Contest 
Sponsor Kevin Shaw 
7--16-2019...

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Looking back on those tumultuous summers
from nineteen sixty-five through sixty-eight:
   Recalling
   Harlem and Newark
   Detroit and Chicago
   Watts and even LA--
Young folks have asked me, Could JFK have saved the day?

Here is my answer
Don't know if it's right
After all I'm an outsider, I'm white

Yet it seems to me... 
LBJ's civil rights legislation
somehow, one way or another
failed miserably in its implementation
  ~ igniting 'uncivil riots' conflagrations....

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