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Seamless
Her middle finger
Became the flag pole upon which
She waved a fond
Good-riddens to her domestication
Tired of cat and cattle
Pussy and poultry
Now panther of bull
Predator of promise
She hunts, I gather ...
She gets hands dirty
Knee padless kneeling her way up
To a heaven past womenless pulpits
Mounts something besides me
Past the apex of modernity
She posts up on the other side
I wash
And clean
This manure made of misguided manhood
And masticate motherhood for awhile
Alone.
Then back to daily chores
Folding clothes
While she unfolds her womb like a quilt
As I admire her inner patchwork
She has sutured her identity together
In a world that would punch bruises
Stitch by stitch
Building boys
With bandages and spit
Stroking our egos
Lick
- by lick
- by lick...
But when she unfolds herself
I am made small
By the highway of experiences she unravels
...Then blankets me in
The placenta red carpet she rolls out
When she pretends she's not bigger than me
When she pretends god hasn't given her
Her greatest trick
Day after
Day six
I've taken up sewing
To pay homage
To her needlework
Threading heroines out of thin air
Re-weaving histories
On bed spreads
Reclaiming that strange bedfellows space
Re-applying black eye liners
De-masculinize
This unsightly site of incarceration, burnt stakes and rapes
Recover grace
With the beauty of her unfolded
Her own comforter
Rebuilding herself block by block
Putting together our world
Person
- by
- Person.
Fleet
A fleet of suicidal angels
Cast a beautiful symmetry of shadow
On the runway of my heart
Before dive bombing
One by one
Into eventual potholes
Craters where heavenly bodies once touched down
Now
My launchpad
Un-land-able
My runway
Stood still
Nothing flies here anymore
Not banners
Not guardians
Not faith
She was the last one
That was her fleet
Election Eve
History is behind us
In the face of a mestizo man mounted on a metropolitan wall
One that wails for tags from graffiti artists
Worn as murals
Badges of pride
That only pain can bring
The cracks in his teeth allow for the change
Same way bridges don't break
Not unlike bones in the bricks we face
Time heals all histories
My beloved ghetto a cold sore on the face America
Kissing its empire goodbye
She can see it
And doesn't want to so much as shake my hand
Can't even break promises with a straight face anymore
Cause...
Histories have been repeating me
Creating hopeful futures in my seed
I've become the half mother,
Half naked
Standing half-way 'tween home and hell
Half the distance between a barreling mack truck and tragedy
Help me god
Holding the hand of my offspring and screaming stop
I've become the half father
Listening to screams and dying from them at the same time
I've become the half righteous
And half rightless...
Trying to figure out how to both fight a war and vote at the same time without being disenfranchised...
I've become half offspring
Half everything
To half brothers who don't have sisters
But have Sistas for role models and grandmothers
Half student
Half teacher
Half slave driver
And half illegitimate child of forefathers
Desperately trying to be bastardized
Harvesting my organs to divorce myself from capitol-izms I
Didn't ask to be displaced, de-naturalized
Tried to save the slave race
Do what they say and stick the same race
Skin or presidential, Indian reservation, big gaming race
But no matter how hard I try to expatriate
Master baited great grandmothers til my DNA was left raped leaving me with these unmistakably American
features
Half sinner
Half preacher
Gotta get a lil dirty to clean
Gotta get a lil hungry or I'll forget to eat
Half unapologetic
Half forgiven
Half home and half homeless
Been called African-unAmericanisms in my own living room
But it wasn't me who abandoned my home, it was my homeland who got up and left
But if someone gets shot on my property it's my body
If this address wins the lottery it's mine probably
So I'm responsible for the skeletons in the closets of my lobby it's...
This thing I can't give away
So my identity is tightly noose rope tied to my birthplace
100% American
Just like last names bind me to relatives I may not like
But love nonetheless
Like I can't be divorced from my history or experiences because in the end...
That's all I am.
Half me
And half the world I live in
Have son and happy to see his mother's half in him
Cause I'm not all right
But doing better
Sun has everything to gain tomorrow
The future is in front of him
THIS face?
Not unlike his
Mounted on 30 inches of moving image wall
One that begs him to climb it
Because now,
Those who have scaled it before have been "his kind"
Half his story...half his future
Just like the wall...
Not an obstacle but a time to pause...
The way over is around
Half past
He'll have half a mind to realize that the wall is established-ment
But if he just stops for half a second to ponder the last century and a half
He'll see that historic obstacle...
Not as a hurdle, but as a canvas
A spray paint can in one hand...and a dream in the other
It's not just that tomorrow's outcome could possibly have my son believe that "Presidents"
And not Zebras, Oreos or "Pick a side, Black or White...Blue or Red", you mixed up
- muts
Come from Black Fathers and White Mothers
It's that he can imagine that conquered wall to be whatever he wants
In a way that even gives this cynic his childhood back...
And he can in fact...
Finally...
Dream in color.
Hakim Ballemy is a two-time National Champion in the Poetry Slam scene. He was a member of the 2005 National Poetry Slam Champs Team Albuquerque in his first year of poetry slam, 6 months after his first ever slam, which he also won. The following year he was a member of the 2006 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational Champs Team UNM. One Albuquerque City Championship (2005) and 3 consecutive University of New Mexico LOBOSLAM titles later, Hakim respects the blessing, but could care less about winning poetry slams, as opposed to cultivating creativity. Hence, Hakim is in the process of adding playwrite and actor to his resume. A resume that already includes: freelance journalist, community organizer and social justice advocate. HakimÕs poetry and journalism have been published internationally as well as his radio journalism on KUNM 89.9FM out of Albuquerque, NM. He is currently working for the New Mexico Office of African American Affairs and is a board member for Poetic Justice Institute and Black Cowgirl Productions as well. He is most proud of being the former Poetry Club coach at South Valley Academy. His poetry has been published in Albuquerque inner-city buses as a winner of the RouteWords Competition (2005). His poetry has been published in the Harwood Anthology (2006), the Earthships Anthology (2007), Sin Fronteras Journal (2008), A Bigger Boat published by UNM Press (2008) and Looking Back at Place (2008). In January of last year, Bellamy was recognized as an honorable mention for the University of New Mexico Paul Bartlett Re Peace Prize for his work as a community organizer and journalist. He is regular contributor to The District and BOOM Magazines as well as a freelancer for Radio Free America.(February 09)
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