|
Old Ladies and Dope Boys
1.
Thelma and Ruth are almost 90
they sit behind multiple locked doors
in GI bill homes they keep from fading
with gardens and fresh paint
They are surrounded by artifacts
of a time when their homes swelled
of skinned knees and stuffed bellies,
rock headed kids, wise cracking uncles,
stern aunts and sweaters
They are guards of the great gallery
of framed Martin Luther King Jr. photos
school pictures from three generations
collages of kool-aid smiles and military uniforms
afros and sideburns, dashikis and business suits,
Karl Kani, Cross Colours and Gumby cuts
An archive of ebony essence black enterprise and jet
stacked near the King James Bible,
the 10 edition new world revised, a pocket-sized bible,
and some spare bibles just in case
Thelma and Ruth alone cook family sized meals
as if the aroma would lure enough back
to require the leaf to be slid through the dining room
table crammed in the small kitchen
They love when you come home from the speed
and global visions so they can get a ride to the grocery store
the good one, since the bus stopped running in 83
2.
across the street
the whole family
razor blades
triple fades
tilted baseball caps
sit around
triple beams
mayonnaise jars
and baking soda
the whole family
been in on it
since it arrived
in 84 in 85
stacking
breaking
into tiny vials
serving and
turning their neighbors
into ghosts
into shreads
of their previous bodies
while the talented
tenth looked ahead
like lot
3.
Detroit neighborhood blocks
are Old ladies and Dope boys
on porches in a standoff
unafraid
neither buying what the other is selling
Underneath the condo skeletons
that sob in private and smile on stages
that hate whimsy
moving money around
Under the freezing weight
2.
you won't hear this
only move when the beat drops
slammin calloused fingertips
giant
in cave
only know how to listen
resent the waking world
Idris Goodwin is an award winning hip hop playwright, break beat poet, recording artist and teacher committed to making work that incites, inspires, and engages. The National Endowment for the Arts awarded Idris a Playwright-in-Residence grant to explore hip-hop aesthetics in theater. Idris' break beat poetry was featured on season six of Russell Simmons' HBO Def Poetry as well as the Spoken Word Revolution Redux Anthology. Idris frequently teaches and lectures at institutions across the country on themes of art and activism.(August 2008)
City on the Scrape
1.
before they get muscle mass
surrounded by children
Weds night drink special rock stars
in it for the stench of barroom floors
and applause
loath the sentimental
live squalor and squat in viaducts
calling for Sunday rations
ride bicycles in hail storms
to wait on wise men
like a tether ball
until they bleed ice water
keeping cash between mattresses
and cocaine between nail and fingertip
of impending hysteria
watching their innocence fly away like a
helium balloon.
don't go to poetry readings
stage plays or youth slams
don't ride public transportation
wake before 3pm
dressed in album cover art
when the curtain rolls up
when the pipe is passed
on MPC and strings
fondling the fader, imagining Prometheus
a six-corner legend
with a marquee name
thirsty desperate
shrouded figures
keep mic cords tangled
burnin til sunrise
to dusty brothers on rotation
the way they plead for their soul
think them not strong enough
for the stress worn thick like triple fat goose