STATE OF THE GHETTO ADDRESS

Click here to listen to Blackman Preach read this poem.

It should be the loudest movement of all times

of all times

OF

ALL

TIMES

Black, coloreds, negroes, Africans in America—Africans

WHATEVER

you may be when you tune into—no news station, radio

or whatever medium you visit this day—

the address will not be televised

for static will be the only sound you'll hear &

the message will be broadcast through word of mouth

there won’t be enough time to gather those scapegoat NEGRO leaders

JESSIE,

COLIN POWELL,

SHARPTIN,

Kweisi Mfume & my favorite, Farrakhan—

ready to save the ass of Miss America—for she will be

DECROWNED & DETHROWNED—

who’s going to be their president?

an AFRICAN in AMERICA—AFRICANS...

with fatigued warlike bodies

&  the callous hands ready to steer the soldiers—

of the ghetto address

from the East to West, North and South,

globally taking strategic & drastic measures to react—a nation

that was brought out of

Liberia, Ghana, Senegal & Benin,

500 hundreds of years ago

that are still traveling through the wilderness?

running away from the children of pharaoh—

the Hitler’s, Kennedy’s, Nixon’s, Carter’s, Reagan’s,

Bush’s, Clinton’s & a son of a Bush—

it’s time to turn around & head to that Promised Land

by any means necessary

with the Black president leading his black nation

reclaiming what’s rightfully ours

without losing souls to deception

of the many distraction and diversions

that will throw us off

the goal of the ghetto address

that will be like a party on the dawn of the greatest revolution

to occur in & across the nations where slavery still exists:

in the slums of the pimps,

the jones of the drug dealers,

the welfare of the single parents,

the agony of the athletes,

the haven of the churches,

the liqueur of the bars,

the circle of the social places,

the clubs, the malls

& the underground,

where the real soldier have been hiding from their

uncles & auntie toms

that we have allowed to kill what’s left of the little

dignity we have,

so, I’m taking lead to behead any fool

trying to stop the forward motion

as the drumsticks are splitting,

as the drumsticks are splitting;

as the drumsticks are splitting,

from the roll— of

the warrior’s death percussion. 

The preceeding words are lyrics from the CD Bumpy Tymes

Click here to listen to Blackman Preach read this poem.

BlackCommentator.com Spoken Word Columnist, Poet Blackman Preach (Cedric T. Bolton), is a poet (spoken word artist) and producer, born in Pascagoula, Mississippi and raised in Paterson, New Jersey. Cedric received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Western Washington University and currently resides, with his wife, in Syracuse, New York.  He is the Founder of Poetic Black Fusion, a writers' workshop that provides access and opportunities to poets of African Ancestry living in Central New York.  He is also the co-founder of Voices Merging, a student-run poetry organization (spoken word) at the University of Minnesota that provides a social outlet for undergraduate students to develop as writers, network and express themselves on stage. He has been writing poetry for 14 years and is published in the Ethnic Student Center's Newsletter at Western Washington University, The Spokesman Recorder, and St. Cloud Times. Click here to contact Blackman Preach.