POEM + AUDIO: MY EYES WIDE OPEN

photo by Alex Lear

 

 

 

 

my eyes wide open:

an open letter to my executioners

 

 

if you

catch me, so be it

 

my dark face knows

bush joys

i laugh at your square world

alternatives, everything you offer

smells like jail

 

my hair has been clipped

many, many times

but i continue to let it grow

choosing my beard over the edge

of your razor

 

track me with your dogs, spy

my toe prints on the mud

where i ran, where i danced

 

catch me if you can

and if you do

so be it

 

but before i'd dine on your

stolen feasts

i'll drink rain,

wash myself in the streams of life

and keep steppin'

keep steppin'

keep right on steppin' down the road

past my people's martyred bones

broken and stacked in irregular piles

by the wayside, past skulls

perched on poles, cruel totems

which i decline to heed

 

even if i have to go

totally nude to fight your dragons

you will not detour me

i will go

i will live while i'm alive

i refuse to die while i am alive

  refuse

 

i will even go to your white wall

place my firm handprint on the

  damp stucco darkened by body

  fluids siphoned from murdered comrades

reject the charity of your blindfold

wink as i stare down your bullets, and

greet sweet death with

my eyes wide open

 

catch me if you can

and if you do

so be it

 

—kalamu ya salaam

 

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Musical composition: "Friday The 13th" by Thelonious Monk

 

Kalamu ya Salaam – vocals

Stephan Richter – clarinet

Wolfi Schlick – tenor

Frank Bruckner – guitar

 

Recorded: May 31, 1998 – Munich, Germany