internalized colonization

repatriated souls
holds whats golden to them
what can't dissolve their resolve
love for the masses strengthens them
this truth suppressed, becomes revolutionary
in the times of deceit
this truth that we consume
is a different food that we eat.
voices for change echo across
third world nations alike
brothers and sisters who are a minority
in this country can't see beyond the fact
that globally we are a majority in unity
it is our blood that built these countries
it was our blood that soaked the earth
it was our women who were raped
and died on slave ships
in plantation fields while giving birth.
it was our men who bore the lashes
by the overseer's whip.
and our original history, religion, culture
from our ka that was ripped
how dear you AMERICA, UK, FRANCE, SPAIN,
HOLLAND, DENMARK, GERMANY, BELGIUM
consider this a necessary evil
then got nerve to demonize my Oba, my Obatala, My Golden Stool
as the works of the devil.

tell me a story,
tell me my story,
teach me about legacies that
runs through my veins
revealing to me stories of slaves
while in the fields cutting sugar cane
let me visualize the birth of my ancestors
in cotton fields, working in the
plantations till their hands bleed.
because I wanna know,
I wanna know everything
from slaves castles to the plantation hyms
we'd sing.
From Nat Turner revolt to the
dream of Dr. King
Because I wanna know
I wanna know, I wanna know about
COINTELPRO and why we only celebrate
this only one month out of the year
when throughout their life for us
it was blod sweat and tears.
teach me about my legacy that runs through
this descendent of slave's veins
so that the pains my ancestors endured
would never be in vain.

on this day that I learnt he died
on this day i learnt that they took him away
on this day in this room where we honor him
there was not a dry eye.
there was not a soul who did not have a hole in his heart
not a throat that did not choke, on his speeches
because history teaches, what he fought for
yet today we all claim hypocritically to carry his legacy
when we don't even carry an identity
was it in vain, was all the pain of the sit ins
and beat downs and blood that soaked the ground
that became mundane. was it in vain?

BLACK WALL STREET

We are told by the media that the attack on the federal building in Oklahoma City, OK was the most tragic bombing ever to take place on United States soil. They're wrong, plain and simple. That's because an even deadlier bomb occurred in that same state nearly 75 years ago. Many people in high places would like to forget that it ever happened. Searching under the heading of "riots" "Oklahoma" and "Tulsa" in current editions of the World Book Encyclopedia, there is conspicuously no mention whatsoever of the Tulsa race riot of 1921, and this omission is by no means a surprise, or a rare case. The fact is, one would also be hard-pressed to find documentation of the incident, let alone an accurate accounting of it, in any other "scholarly" reference or American history book. That's precisely the point that noted author, publisher, and orator Ron Wallace, a Tulsa native, sought to make nearly five years ago when he began researching this riot, one of the worst incidents of violence ever visited upon people of African descent. Ultimately joined on the project by colleague Jay Wilson of Los Angeles, the duo found and compiled indisputable evidence of what they now describe as "a Black holocaust in America." The date was June 1, 1921, when "Black Wall street," the name fittingly given to one of the most affluent all-Black communities in America, was bombed from the air and burned to the ground. In a period spanning fewer than 12 hours, a once thriving 36-Black business district in northern Tulsa lay smoldering--a model community destroyed, and a major African-American economic movement resoundingly defused. The night's carnage left some 3,000 African Americans dead, and over 600 successful businesses lost. Among these were 21 churches, 21 restaurants, 30 grocery stores and two movie theaters, plus a hospital, a bank, a post office, libraries, schools, law offices, a half dozen private airplanes and even a bus system. As could have been expected the impetus behind it all was the infamous Ku Klux Klan, working in consort with ranking city officials, and many other sympathizers. In their self-published book, Black Wall street: A Lost Dream, and its companion video documentary, Black Wall street: A Black Holocaust in America!, the authors have chronicled for the very first time in the words of area historians and elderly survivors what really happened there on that fateful summer day in 1921 and why it happened. Wallace similarly explained to me why this bloody event from the turn of the century seems to have had a recurring effect that is being felt in predominately Black neighborhoods even to this day. The best description of Black Wall street, or Little Africa as it was also known, would be liken it to a mini-Beverly Hills. It was the golden door of the Black community during the early 1900s, and it proved that African Americans had successful infrastructure. That's what Black Wall street was all about. The dollar circulated 36 to 100 times, sometimes taking a year for currency to leave the community. Now in 1995, a dollar leaves the Black community in 15-minutes. As far as resources, there were Ph.D.'s residing in Little Africa, Black attorneys and doctors. One doctor was Dr. Berry who owned the bus system. His average income was $500 a day, a hefty pocket change in 1910. During that era, physicians owned medical schools. There were also pawn shops everywhere, brothels, jewelry stores, 21 churches, 21 restaurants and two movie theaters. It was a time when the entire state of Oklahoma had only two airports, yet six Blacks owned their own planes. It was a very fascinating community. The area encompassed over 600 businesses and 36 square blocks with a population of 15,000 African Americans. And when the lower-economic Europeans looked over and saw what the Black community created, many of them were jealous. When the average student went to school on Black Wall street, he wore a suit and tie because of the morals and respect they were taught at a young age. The mainstay of the community was to educate every child. Nepotism was the one word they believed in. And that's what we need to get back to. The main thoroughfare was Greenwood Avenue, and it was intersected by Archer and Pine Streets. From the first letters in each of those three names, you get G.A.P., and that's where the renowned R &B music group The Gap Band got its name. They're from Tulsa. Black Wall street was a prime example of the typical Black community in America that did businesses, but it was in an unusual location. You see, at the time, Oklahoma was set aside to be a Black and Indian State. There were over 28 Black townships there. One-third of the people who traveled in the terrifying "Trail of Tears" along side the Indians between 1830 to 1842 were Black people. The citizens of this proposed Indian and Black State chose a Black governor, a treasurer from Kansas named McDade. But the Ku Klux Klan said that if he assumed office that they would kill him within 48 hours. A lot of Blacks owned farmland, and many of them had gone into the oil business. The community was so tight and wealthy because they traded dollars hand-to-hand, and because they were dependent upon one another as a result of the Jim Crow laws. It was not unusual that if a resident's home accidentally burned down, it could be rebuilt within a few weeks by neighbors. This was the type of scenario that was going on day-today on Black Wall street. When Blacks intermarried into the Indian culture, some of them received their promised '40 acres and a mule' and with that came whatever oil was later found on the land. Just to show you how wealthy some Black people were, there was a banker in the neighboring town who had a wife named California Taylor. Her father owned the largest cotton gin west of the Mississippi [River]. When California shopped, she would take a cruise to Paris every three months to have her clothes made. There was also a man named Mason in nearby Wagner County who had the largest potato farm west of the Mississippi. When he harvested, he would fill 100 boxcars a day. Another brother not far away had the same thing with a spinach farm. The typical family then was five children or more, though the typical farm family would have 10 kids or more who made up the nucleus of the labor. On Black Wall street, a lot of global business was conducted. The community flourished from the early 1900s until June 1, 1921. That's when the largest massacre of nonmilitary Americans in the history of this country took place, and it was lead by the Ku Klux Klan. Imagine 1,500 homes being burned. Survivors we interviewed think that the whole thing was planned because during the time that all of this was going on, white families with their children stood around the borders of their community and watched the massacre, the looting and all.