Long Emmett Poems

Emmett Till Emmett Till
Why was it you they had to kill
Why did they drag you from your bed
Why did they pistol whip your head

What exactly did you do
To make them do this thing to you
Just...

Read More

there comes a time when
people you once respected
reveal
or you discover
the real
person behind the mask

face facts
people who never wanted you
to do better
than them
are now wishing
that you would 
shut your mouth
stop your tweeting
delete your facebook
get out of...

Read More

I am Emmett Till. 
I was beaten to death, so how dare you go through everyday life complaining that it's "pure hell". 
I'd rather be locked up in a jail cell. 
Or sitting in a...

Read More

In a past life I must have killed a priest, 
 or could it be that on flesh i did feast?
Maybe I brutally raped a God ordained nun.
 Because in this life I am being...

Read More

Black Power

My power to read
My power to write
My power to lead
My power to fight.
My power to vote
My power to take notes
My power to see
To be who I be.
For, I am free
For, I am love
For, I...

Read More

For me, crazy is a loose term.Crazy is when you 
stare at a pencil and laugh when someone
asks you what you are doing that is so 
interesting about the eraser. Crazy is when you have...

Read More

1955 Was a Very Good Year

By Elton Camp

A better year in my life I have never seen
Because, back then, I was only age fifteen
Nobody I knew had, at that time, ever died
Any problems of the...

Read More

So there was black kid
His name was Vincent
Chubby and innocent
Intelligent, but belligerent
Aged 13, he had his first crush
Abigail, a white girl
Pigtails and eyes colored like clam pearls
Only conflict, her family was racist
Her older brother, Nathan,...

Read More

Airy Wells and Emmett Street were working class kids,
Just shy of a high school diploma.
Airy’s mom had a habit of drinking too much.
Emmett’s father was fighting lymphoma.

Airy and Emmett had jobs after school,
And mostly just...

Read More

for


             I

In the distance, the fading sun
bade adieu and slipped
behind the golden horizon;
the moon slowly sneaked 
from behind the ivory clouds and
greeted the...

Read More

Thank you Daddy for taking Jane and me to the circus


He took the bumps fast along Broadway; we giggled and laughed; it was a great day.

The bustle, the hustle, the poor old men.  I...

Read More

Body left dissipated, obliterated,
oh Emmett Till,
Investigators could not tell if it was a human or mutilated road kill,
his eye was gouged from his head,
barbed wire tied around his neck,
all because a caucasian woman,
claimed she didn't...

Read More

Chicago native Emmett Till would no longer be alive
after he was lynched in the state of Mississippi in 1955.
Till was on summer vacation in a village called Money.
It's located in the delta region of the...

Read More

Mamie Till Mobley demanded and open casket,
to let the world see,
the bloated, beaten body of her baby boy,
who was lynched in Mississippi.

His name was Emmett Till,
a 14 year old black boy, 
who came from the...

Read More

Pairing knives peppered the garden growing by the river.
Eerie sounds slid sideways into the lowering light.
Alfy and Alice were still out cavorting beyond the barn.
Children in dusty blue dresses yawned on the paint-chipped deck.
Ernie and...

Read More

My mind cannot erase the memory of Emmett Till
I often dream about his badly-mutilated body –
The fourteen-year-old Black lad mercilessly beaten
To death … for ostensibly flirting with a white woman.
A victim of the era in...

Read More

A complicated issue may often be better understood 
By breaking it down into a few undeniable facts. 
This is especially helpful with comprehending 
An issue that is new, or unfamiliar.
For example:
Thomas Jefferson was a famous...

Read More

Born out on Highway 9 down in Corpus
Saw a mermaid in the gulf or maybe a porpoise
What a time at South Padre during Spring break
In Amarillo one time I tried to eat a giant steak

And...

Read More

he placed his dreams on a Greyhound bus trip
headed west down that interstate highway
the nectar of labor beckoned his lips
fruit of the strangest kind graced the front page
signs more telling than the constitution
categorized this creation...

Read More

Emmett was a man of malignant mien
The crazy son of his saint of a mother
A callous hooligan, cruel but keen
Acumen and class matched by no other

Drawn to the drink, and the roll of dice
His devilish...

Read More

Fuzzy little balls of fur, 
 Sleep, stretch, then yawn.
Snuggle up to warmth, 
 and keep me up 'til dawn.

Eyes that are opening, 
 and at first they are blue.
Can't wait to see the final...

Read More

Do you recall the song "Send In The Clowns" by Sinatra?

I reckon folks even heard it who reside in faraway Sumatra.

Long gone is famed Emmett Kelly who portrayed "Weary Willie",

And the great Red Skelton whose...

Read More