I Can'T Breathe
I Can’t Breathe
My Country, I ask of thee,
why do you still hate me?
America the Beautiful,
why, why, am I scorned and reviled,
your unwanted dark child?
With your knee on my neck,
I’m still enslaved,
gasping for breath..
gasping for breath…
waiting for the Angel of Death.
You despise my skin,
this honeyed skin of a blackened hue;
you lynch me - hang me from a tree,
from sea to shining sea.
Dear God, will I ever be free?
With your knee on my neck,
I’m still enslaved,
gasping for breath..
gasping for breath…
waiting for the Angel of Death.
Enslaved by your forefathers
from the 17th Century,
you sent your hounds after me,
set me on fire,
ripped the baby from my swollen belly...
why oh why, Sweet Land of Liberty?
Why are you free only for some...
but never for me?
With your knee on my neck,
I’m still enslaved,
gasping for breath..
gasping for breath…
waiting for the Angel of Death.
You curse my dark skin
and I'm nothing to you,
I'm just a non-entity with no soul.
Yes, my crime is my blackness;
heartless, you laugh as I plead,
heartless you watch as I bleed...
and then you watch me die.
With your knee on my neck,
I’m still enslaved,
gasping for breath..
gasping for breath…
waiting for the Angel of Death.
You've shackled and pinned me down,
now I’m helpless on the ground...
and I can’t breathe;
I'm telling you ... I can't breathe.
But as I take my last breath,
don't you ever forget,
that not even the Angel of Death…
can obliterate the generations
that will take root and rise up,
from my Blessed Blackness.
Date: 06-13-2020
Contest: I Can't Breathe Poetry Contest
Sponsor: Richard Lamoureux
Placement: 2nd Place
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