Sit down and think for a minute of how we came to be
Right here, right now,
From prisoners of intercine wars, and descendents of enslaved Africans
Across the main land to the sea shore, chained and shackled,
Whipped and raped, spat on, forbidden to read, taken away from your GOD,
Your culture, your language, your past, taken away from your identity
Placed on auction blocks as sons lost their mothers, daughter lost their fathers
Husbands lost their wives, families never the same

Think again for a brief moment,
When the first letters of self determination was written,
When acts of self determination, tattooed in our psyche
As many of our ancestors turned to the North Star
As many of our ancestors became maroons, formed
Their own societies, their own communities,
Like the first Free African Society, and Black Churches
Was organized and blacks began advocating for freedom, for equality.

Think of the times when non-violence served its purpose,
As thousands lay their bodies on the line with sound mind
Body and soul knowing that they shall not be moved.
Think about the times when fist punched the sky
And afros, the barrel of a gun, and we all read FRANTZ FANON
Where Black was Comely, where BLAKCNESS was reclaimed

Think about this journey to the where we arrive in the present
Where we have arrived at the possibility of a Black President.
After being kidnapped, and whipped and raped, and dragged across an ocean
Where we weren’t allowed to read, write, pray, or possess our own bodies.
Here we stand on the threshold of an AUDACITY
Here we stand on the doorsteps of toppling notions white supremacy
Here we stand on the doorsteps of having an honest discourse on race
And may be on slavery
And may be on the colonialism, colorism, and sexism,
Or maybe it would be an excuse to forget about the past that rendered
Us drones and zombies,
Just BLACK BODIES stacked up in football stadiums
hacked up in Rwanda, and bombed Tulsa Oklahoma
massacred in Sudan and neglected in Haiti,
where are we, who are we,
as we assess this progress in our illusionary realities
hoping for a change
hoping that may be we can forget we lived for 500 years
hoping that we have finally dried our eyes and there isn’t any tears.