the dream perverted

I fear Dr. Martin Luther King was turning in his grave during a meeting in Brunswick County, VA a few weeks ago. Blacks and Whites united, but not in harmony... in discord against Latino teenagers.

We looked at Virginia,

Saw southern Hospitality,

Saw Christian conservatism at its finest,

A place where knowledge hadn't puffed up, 

Where claims of charity edified,

Thought surely this is the place!

But a Black woman's fangs ripped savagely

At an open board meeting,

And the mission receded cowardly

While the mob chanted,

"Send those dirty babies home"

And I, stunned, looked at all the hatred;

How the Negroes had elevated themselves

By inserting a new Pariah

Below their long held bottom place

On America's totem pole

In narcissistic fashion,

And White mongers painted as Christians

Slinging spit from their toothless ignorance,

Sang along

In true dirty south diction

In high definition footage reminiscent

Of Alabama and desegregation protests.

Red children seeking desperately 

Through indoor chain linked fences;

Managed surviving surf board freight trains

From their cactus diet rotting guts,

Mistaking the America for pearly gates...

No child, go back home.

Reviews

[jacob erin-cilberto]

i hate "hate"---

it trickles down the ladder doesn't it?

this is a very effective story poem..."mistaking the America for pearly gates"

Land of the free? unless you are the most current minority.

[Claire in VA]

Powerful, POWERFUL lines....."....Mistaking America for pearly gates.../ No child, go back home."

This makes me cry. So sad.

~Claire