When my sun begins to set

and my eyes are heavy
with the weight of
war cries and revolutions,
sing with me.
I won’t die quietly.

Through swollen eyes and iron bars,
my people always looked to the future like a prayer,
a dream passed down for generations.

A boy with Eden in his eyes and ignorance as a birthright
once told me I was a romantic,
but I know the jagged beat of bullets,
cutting air too well
not to look for God in
every valley of my father's voice

He used to sing of better tomorrows and his mother's garden,
but I wanted forever
in those untamed vines
an sun drowned dandelions that look so much like home

But these days,
I think Billie must've been a prophet.
Strange fruits rot in the street
while the traffic drowns a mother's cry

Their black bodies fill the midnight sky
with those heavy cotton clouds you could almost pick

I'm seeing stars
every Sunday morning
as I get dizzy off their holy medley,
and pass out to the sound of gunshots