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Ray X. Johnson Poem
I remember as a young child,
sitting on the stone steps
of my South Philadelphia
neighborhood,
Inquisitively witnessing
the massive amounts
of scattered debris,
sprinkled across
the concrete sidewalks
& black asphalt streets...
Like a nuclear waste site
of embittered souls in retreat,
from something I had yet to really meet,
but what interested me
was the clear
& dark
& brown
& green
empty broken bottles that seemed
to create its own dangerous art form,
that spelled lacerations & abrasions...
upon our beautiful African skin tones...
when we tripped & fell
against the portraits frail details,
which were once completely filled
bottles of bubbly ginger ale...
& Pepsi
& coca-colas
& mountain dews
& doctor peppers,
that seemed to capture
the juicy flavored dreams
& lives magnified inside,
the revealing glass receptacles
of thirst quenching desires...
Now guzzled up
by the romantic mirage of life,
where many had not become recycled
and was savagely tossed like dice...
shattering onto inner city floors
now called ghettos
& hoods
& boroughs
landing in tar & concrete crevices
like too many needles in a hay stack,
fragmented, kicked & ravaged -
but not unnoticed...
because, now whenever I am
walking down my block thinking about
my next moves to empowerment,
something slightly glitters
from within the dark
sparking peripheral vision -
sharply piercing my eyes to notice;
and I am reminded of all
the shattered lives, that lie
parallel amongst the debris
of all these broken bottles...
Ray X. Johnson 5/18/99
Copyright © Ray X. Johnson | Year Posted 2010
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Ray X. Johnson Poem
I could not stop for death*
even after,
my daddy died from pneumonia
when I was like 4 or 5 years old
vague memories deprive him
of a real definitive place -
so I no longer search for him
nor the withering parts of Momma
that have scattered leisurely
into a hell she made a life
& maybe it was set up that way
maybe all she wanted to do was cry -
& maybe those were her tears
that dripped so consistently
from those diabetic syringes
filled with poisonous self-inflicted
pain swelling arms oozing pus
& maybe she really believes the hype
that her business wasn't our business-
even after
the devil's audit results
& see...
i don't need a cripple's crutch
but what does she really think
as she watches her daughter dying
a carbon copy black suicide ?
& says "boy i did my best"
& is she talking to me I wonder
or is she talking to death...
still - i could not stop.
- Ray x. Johnson 1999
*line inspired by Emily Dickinson poem "because I could not stop for death"
Copyright © Ray X. Johnson | Year Posted 2010
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Ray X. Johnson Poem
Touchable
I resort in sacred chambers
To meditate on an untouchable
Presence….
Tirades of passion simmer
Like magna spawn lava
Creating liquid paths,
I know lead to paradise…
The romantic gist of conflict
That appreciates the sweetness
Which is shared between lips,
Even before hips gyrate or
Stroll through forbidden
Gardens late…
Only to Skinny-Dip In forever
Like two lovers lost In summer,
Hoping to capture;
The presence of soft touches,
Holy spirits & volcanic eruptions.
- Ray X. Johnson 1/1/10
Copyright © Ray X. Johnson | Year Posted 2010
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