Click here to listen to Blackman Preach read this poem.

KILLING THE MESSENGERS  

They’re killing the messengers…

Who’s killing the messenger?

They are them ova there…

They’re killing the messenger…

Who’s killing the messenger?

The policy makers—“sitting up on capitol hill”

but

I’m a bill designed to blowout the backs of the blue collar

N-E-GRO

catering three non-paying gigs

but can we eat—cause

faith-based current economic status

makes it difficult to feed the next intense thinkers

who can’t seem to get their homework done

because their

moaning

stomach

ache from their ribs

knocking on the surface of their skin.

They’re killing the messengers…

Who’s killing the messengers?

They are

sitting

in

clusters

saluting Buster’s “Pass the Courvoisier”

while choking Cheach and dumb,

y’all know the ones

who can’t keep their pants above the waist-line

the generation rap-X-NE-GROs

stuck in Khia, Jay-Z, DMX,

Ja-Rule, Ludicrous—

50 Cash Money Millionaires

watching “The Wash” & “How High”

that’s turning our young philosophers into TV junkies

fiending

off

of

Meth & Red-man

who are so caught up in their own asses

that—they can’t seem to realize

how much they are contributing to

the slaughter of our junior messengers.

They’re killing the messengers…

Who’s killing the messenger?

they are

the corporate corporations laundering liquid corruption

via emails and phone transactions

as Enron and World-dot-com Executives

CASH-OUT

Ford, Sony, Whirlpool, General Motors,

Hewitt Packard, General Electric and Phillip Morris

who are transferring images of corruption in the psyche of the impressionable children struggling to read

but can recite pound for pound

“My Back My Neck”… “My Back My Neck”…

They’re killing the messenger…

Who’s killing the messengers?

They are

the compromisers

who will not compromise for the better of the ghetto

that use to be a community

when the Europeans lived there

before their drugs & violence dominated

it was sorrel & tranquil

so their messengers could grow

and be the best in middle schools

& colleges

traveling in and out of town—

LIVING

where in the ghetto the life expectancy

is from 10—20 years of age,

NOW

Do you know who’s killing the messenger??

They are—them—ova there.

The preceeding words are lyrics from the CD State of the Ghetto Address

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.