Florida

The Stranger

All I need is money and a car

And shuffle the Duartes back to hell,

Except that he's in love with the Duartes,

So hell has got a residence on earth.

And a publisher and to be great.

Black men have their troubles. Stay away

From southerners and white men with a sneer.

I am gay. And Harvey Milk was shot.

But black men do not think of Harvey Milk.

He was queer. Who care that he was shot?

And if a black man burns my house to ashes

Because of Florida, I'll see his point.

Prejudice! It is a game for fools

On either side. Why am I construed

As a bigot of most any stripe?

Gays have thought I was a homophobe.

I've been thought eleven kinds of bad

By people that I didn't want to know.

Perhaps because I looked a little strange

And didn't join a camaraderie.

Let the bastards know what you are thinking

Or they'll assume, and they'll assume the worst.

Smile and give them empty-headed greetings

That no one feels, and no one wants to hear.

7-17-13

 

Some More Riots

Zimmerman got an acquittal

And black folk went to war,

Another cause for a riot.

Now how many dead?

When a fagot gets shot in Frisco,

Nobody says a thing,

And cops wear shirts declaring

His killer should go free.

But black folk don't like fagots.

So they don't give a damn.

Lincoln, Kennedy, King.

A few more people killed.

All over the country – I read it -

The cops are on alert -

Riots accomplish nothing -

But they're a lot of fun.

7-17-13

Black

Thinking over all

The black folk I have known

And a couple men I went to bed with

(Which Mary Kelly sneered was psychiatric) -

I've come to the conclusion

That black is royalty

That white supremacists would like deposed.

Mercedes keeps my poems

Nicely in the john -

A little reading while she takes a shit.

And the fools in Oakland

Looking after Matt.

What were they expecting me to do?
A complicated ball

Of twisted tangle yarn.

I don't know if Zimmerman was guilty.

I wasn't there.

It's no excuse for war.

And I have heard their rap

And listened to the threat

In their voices.

What am I to feel?

It isn't how you look, it's what you do,

And what's a fagot ever done to you?

Dionne Warwick, Dianne Carroll,

Nat King Cole are black -

People I am not afraid to meet.

Black! The very word is like aggression.

7-17-13