Clarence Thomas

Clarence Thomas, the only black justice on the Supreme Court and argueably the most powerful black man in this country, appointed through controversy and serving in virtual silence, gave his first in depth personal interview with 60 Minutes. I was going to post a blog about my views and opinions on this interview, but I think I'll just post the interview for you to view and leave you to form your own opinions. For those that did not see it and for those that want to experience it again, Clarence Thomas:

Part I


Part II


Part III

In My Haste

In my rash and foolish haste
of persecution and wayward flight,
I let a good thing go to waste.

Fleeing freedom with fervent pace,
running blind into distant night.
In my rash and foolish haste

Making choices, confusing fate
unsure of what is wrong or right.
I let a good thing go to waste

Propelled by love's confounded hate
enriched with nature's gifted plight.
In my rash and foolish haste

Feigning wisdon in my state
of perplexed judgement and clouded sight.
I let a good thing go to waste

Left with morsels on my plate
I tossed it all as just one might.
In my rash and foolish haste
I let a good thing go to waste

Wolves In the Meadow

So a little background about me. I was born, and for about the first third of my life, raised in Jamaica. For the last two of those years i was raised by my aunt while my mother came to the US, as did a lot of my family, and prepared for me to come join her. We moved to Lakewood NJ, which even though you could find your hood spots, was still considered the suburbs. So now as an adult living in an urban environment I can't claim to have had the urban rearing experience. However, while driving home the other night I was struck by the conditions in which we accept to live.

During the civil war and the civil rights movement, blacks fought an oppressive white racist society and an oppressive unequal government for their freedom and their basic civil rights. So why now when we have acquired both to a greater extent than anytime before in the history of the United States, do black Americans accept the captivity in which we are being enslaved? The poverty stricken urban squallar...held captive not by an oppressive white society, but by drug dealers and gangs that continue to rob our youth of their future. The life-saver gangs that are doing nothing but the opposite. Do we only fight an enemy when they don't look like us? Do we accept this type of oppression of our people because it's coming from our people? or at least people who look like us? Where is the difference in those that would keep us enslaved and those who do nothing more than keep us in poverty and a state perpetual modern day slavery? Have the slave quarters simply been transplanted in the hood? When did we begin to subscribe to the notion of seperate but equal? Gone away are the old "white only" and "black only" signs that used to seperate us, but the color line still exists, only now we're being held back by some of our own people. The Church, once the cornerstones of the black community and a safe haven from the everyday troubles of the outside world, has been replaced by the corner, the hood, the block. This now is the gathering place of our youth, no longer recruited by the church or mentored by their elders, they are recruited by the streets and mentored by the hood and with that the cycle continues and the ellipse just continues to grow larger, engulfing even more of our promised. So when do we realize that yellow bricked road to the land of upliftment and success begins at our front door; by cleaning up the places we call home? Much like any cancer, if left untreated, the condition grows into a state beyond repair. I don't claim to have all the answers to every plight that the black community is now afflicted with, however I do realize that our shephards are really wolves in the meadow and too many people think everything is alright.

Tomorrow's Past (unedited)

Yesterday I was visited by tomorrow's past
Casting smiles and visions of a life once known
Lukewarm happiness fading fast
Digging divots from dreams once sewn

Ushered reminders of unfulfilled destiny
Held by stifling pangs of doubt
Maintaining monuments of what was meant for me
Looking upward while falling south

My life eclipsed by shining stars
As Heaven's angels sing a muted tune
My inner battles turn to outward wars
As light is cast from the sky's new moon

I am met by genesis of a new beginning
Dreams forever circular and never-ending

My One (unedited)

My heart leaps and swims in thoughts of you

Diving deep, summoned to depths of a velvet-like hue

Engulfed in rapture, thoughts swirl from your memory

I float on waves of a promised legacy

Days upon days I wait for your return

Intoxicated by memories of a kiss's slow burn

Choking and thrashing, my lungs fill with laughter

Futilely struggling against an uncertain future

Freeing myself from a cumbersome burden

A life-vest of apprehension swept by Poseidon

Thrown in the deep end of your pool of love

I gasp and sink to the bottom, never learned to swim

I Need a Nap

I'm tired of the rat race, commuting two hours for a job I hate
I'm tired of street corners, dudes on blocks selling weed and rocks
I'm tired of seeing black mothers pushing white babies in strollers, I see it everyday
I'm tired of the war, still not sure what they're dieing for
I'm tired of the struggle, black, white, yellow, brown, if you aint got, you aint got
I'm tired of ignorance, if you don't know, ask somebody or go to www.readafuckingbook.com
I'm tired of begging bums, if I aint got shit, how do you expect me to give you some?
I'm tired of deadbeat fathers, take care of your fucking kids!
I'm tired of niggas praising how they love the hood, you're supposed to rise up outta poverty, not wallow in it stupid!
I'm tired of rap beefs, fuck you and your beef!
I'm tired of hip-hop raising our youth, and doing a fucked up job!
I'm tired of irresponsibility
I'm tired of people saying global warming is a myth, way to be (you know what? See above)
I'm tired of self-pity, get the fuck over it and uplift yourself
I'm tired of OJ's dumb ass!, lock his ass up
I'm tired of a poor education system failing our kids
I'm tired of The Rockefeller Drug Laws
I'm tired of cases like the Jena Six! Not being in the media
I'm tired of the lopsided media
I'm tired of partisan politics and people who only vote within their party even when they know their candidate is fucked up
I'm tired of people who don't vote! Shut the fuck up and stop complaining
I'm tired of complaining, I'm gonna go take a nap.

The Fuckin RN

It's taken me a small chunk of time to arrive at this opening, but finally, I've taken time to sit down and lay foundation to my blog. There've been many times when I've engaged my One, into listening to one of my many musings…he always humors me. He's gonna be surprised at this. Not quite sure what format this is going to take or how it's going to turn out, but we'll see as we venture along and find out together.

I went to the West Indian Day Parade this past Monday and Jah know se me love mi people, but I usually don't like to go this jamboree. I love the celebration of life, spirit and culture that is the main essence of the parade, but there is always an element of…nigga-ism that surrounds and detracts attention from the original agenda. In any group of people you'll find your…undesirables, hence is the gamut that is humankind. When you bring together tens of thousands of people, throw in all the elements of a loud West Indian festival…spicy tongue-titillating samples of sustenance, hip-gyrating body bumping beats bombastically blasting from speakers the size of some mid-sized cars, liquor, not wine or spirits, but liquor carried in concealment by some and openly by others, but consumed in abundance by all. Add some jubilant dancers, dressed vibrantly from head to toe, all colors mixing like a canvas covered by accidental spillage. Floats and trucks carrying revelers and merrymakers alike, intoxicating the throngs of celebrators with an infectious concoction of joyous call and response.

Wave yo Flag!

Wave yo Flag!

And of course, there's the mind-expanding, mind-bending and sometimes mind-destroying herbal stimuli, wafting and marrying with the other fragrances of the day. All of these elements combine to make for a rip-roaring good time. However, as with anything in life, we indulge with a bit of moderation; it's when these indulgences over saturate our psyche that we lose control. Such was the case that upon reaching home and watching the news, I learned of two shootings at the parade; one critical and the other unfortunately fatal. I felt a taste of bitterness at the confirmation of my original apprehension for going. I sat and looked at my people and wondered "How did we get here?"

I was reminded of a previous conversation involving my One, and quite a few other people frankly…he's always up for a good verbal tango, but one segment of the three hour drama, involved a 20 yr old African-American male from Newark who fervently stated, in accordance with his opposition to the Administration now in power, that he does not vote because the government does not care about the hood or the projects…it's do or die. While I do now live in an urban environment as an adult, I was not raised in one as a child so I have not the life experience to first handedly speak on its effects. No, it was not the set of My Wife and Kids, but on the other hand I didn't have to sell drugs at ten to eat, that's his story, and not mine to tell. My quandary is with the living conditions that many people continue to live in. It used to be that as Africans in this country our children were born into slavery and forced to work and live on plantations. Now many of us are born into poverty and forced to live in the projects. Have we become complacent with our current state? Resigned in an attitude of "no way out", have we succumbed to a new slave mentality?

While at the parade, we posted up against an unassuming fence, determined to engulf ourselves in the wonder of the crowd. During an occasion of my One trying to engage passersby in conversation, as he is apt to do, we are introduced to The RN. She stood about five-six, her dark shoulder length press, with its streak of fire across the middle, was in need of a touch up. She needed something Just for Her. Dressed in a purple and white tube top to accentuate her assets ("and I've got these"), her pink purse dangling from her right wrist, which dangled the hand holding her food, she stopped with a start at his behest, almost spilling the two cups of Hennessy held in her left hand. Happily willing to engage in conversation, as most in a state of drunken highness have a tendancy to do, she jumped headlong and fullfledged into a diatribe explaination of her revelry. It was Labor Day and e'rbody suppossed to "get fucked up". I couldn't very well argue that point as I was a bit inebriated myself. She told us of her many family members who had come in from "The British". Her family...from "The British", must have been fucked up at this point too, although they were no where in sight at the moment, for she had spent $900 on all types of liqour just for that point. She didn't care about the money, she was a "fucking RN" and made $80,000.00 a year. But even in her merryment something was troubling her. Where was her car? Her 14 yr old son..."that little bitch", "that nigga", had taken her brand new 07, (the make and model elude me now) three days prior and was nowhere to be found. She just knew "that little bitch" was probably somewhere fucking in it right now. She wasn't ignorant to the fact that he was fucking, she didn't care, he could fuck whoever he wanted to..."as long as he wasn't gay". How absurd a scene? Now there are quite a few ponderings I could pose just on the preposterousness of this last line alone, but I'll leave that to you. My mental plight lies with the conditions we continue to live in and bequeath to our children.

After the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 and the period known as Reconstruction, 1866-1877, many former slaves, grandfathers and their grandchildren sat alongside one another in classrooms eager to gain the tools of freedom: Knowledge. However with the onslaught of resentment from former slave owners who were now forced to live alongside their former slaves as "equals", there came violent retaliations directed at Blacks in the South. Because of this and the prospects of greater opportunities elsewhere, the US saw a great migration of Blacks out of the South to Northern and Western states. With this migration there came an influx of towns and developments founded by a majority black population. However with the barage of racism faced by them a great number of these towns dwindled and the black settlers once again migrated away. After years of struggle, the "failure" of Reconstruction, war and the Great Depression many cities saw a boom in tent villages and slums spring up in their outlying areas. With this came the Housing Act of 1937, designed to clean up the slums and redevelop them into low cost housing. The large-scale projects that we've come to know today came later during the 60's and the civil rights era. Housing projects were never designed to be a permanent status for a people, but were a means and medium in helping those in need to lift themselves out of their current circumstances, with some government subsidiary. All of this being contingent on the choices people made. However, with poverty, drugs and crime some became lost in this new world and the original agenda of the Housing Act of 1937 gave way to the new, larger-scale slums, overrun by crime and desperation.

In one situation you have a mother who chose crack over her children, forcing her ten year old son to sell drugs to feed himself and his younger siblings. But miraculously he survived and is now putting himself through college. In the other situation there's the mother who has achieved economic stability and is able to provide for her son as well as her family from "The British", but doesn't know where he is, that he's probably getting dicked down in the backseat of her 07 or that word is Britain. Both from the projects, both with choices that have led to their current state. So how did we get here?