no gain no pain in the ass fast
forward 2 inflammation swelling
inflammatory response telling the body
you hurt real bad pain prowls sidelines lounging
hard words scrounging up adjectives
sharp … searing … stabbing …
leering never before pain is a warning that proclaims
a major change in forthcoming rains/reigns/of terror
heat/heatwaves/4 dayz & dayz a haze
of unprepared 4 pain
you reach 4 a bottle of (pain) pills
or a bottle of booze 2 catch a snooze
but pain doesn’t mind waiting 3 or 4 more hours 4 the power to charge again again
again Black people don’t give into the inflammation swelling that pain gives
passed
down
generation
to
generational
traumatic
dramatic sounds of words made of bricks & bullets licking our bodies
we revolt
our inflammatory response to a past of slavery & lynchings targeted murders & random killings
still aflame in the 21st they’ll only gets worse
as red states rehearse 2025 & prepare 4
the jive of one who prescribes reinstating stop ‘n frisk at the risk of killing profiled Black men & then
he describes his plan 2 dispatch the military into cities where Blackness resides
lies will be told explaining bold use of assault AK rifles fired into seas of Blackness
painful inflammation descends into madness
Oxy & fentanyl-coated dreams only cloak pain alcohol only numbs
pain acutely shoots chronically stabs jabs at our souls crawls into our joints takes up
residence like a relative who has overstayed
his welcome but we will fight B(l)ack pain exercise our civil
rights to destroy the blight of the tightened muscle of military occupation circa 1967 & 68
in Watts and Detroit around inflamed joints Blackness will push through
fight back in a revolutionary move
because pain like
Cain can’t stay
where not
wanted.
Illustration by Deb Canine