TIME Is
I.
Time (IS)
lost notes I
cannot string
together, a broken
instrument, sheet music
lost. The world’s tiniest violin
playing the same sad song, over and
over, the highest pitch complaint heard
from a bow that rests on colorism’s chin, a resin
reminder not to fall asleep because many from our
redlined neighborhoods were displaced, and their homes
bulldozed and replaced with gentrified concrete slabs for
white factory workers. They reap from our emotional labor
as if they didn’t cheat for better loans, credit scores, and for
generational wealth far beyond ours. Being Black is a mortgage
investment gone wrong, a foreclosure gone bust, a broken heart
a broken glass theory in the Madison neighborhoods, we can afford.
II.
Time (IS) a Ponzi scheme
White Feminism Koa Beck,
Gloria Steinem on the top, Shirley
Chisholm stuck in the middle, Marsha
P. Johnson is holding them all up on their back
like Atlas as retribution for a care web of three
Black womxn/womyn two who identify as Queer,
STARS of another movement to save Black lives from
ending, reclaiming their time, their time (was) taken for granted
preserved no stories because education is too critical talk about
invisible systems of oppression unless it's Don Imus screaming a
troupe about a ball team of nappy-headed hoes. Time (is) a demented
merry-go-round that you cannot get off of. Here is the new thinking, the
fresh ideas like grains of sand that fall through your hands where Feminism
without intersectionality is just white supremacy. Did you know that? Let's fast
forward to the future. Do you remember when your DVD player would do that
back in the day? I swear to god I was the last in my class to get one. Or, if you sit
on your Netflix remote, it scrambles to the next show. Eager to find a new beginning. We
are not done! The Walking Dead protagonists act in despair; pretend there is not a race problem.
I can barely remember the actress shadowed by Rick. Is she just a memory, was she forgotten like time?
III.
Time (IS)
murderous malpractice
Henrietta Lacks cells pulled
from body like a car stuck in the
snow, lining white coats with blood
diamonds, treating infant mortality as
Mammy figures, no cries for the asexual,
James Marion Sims pillaged and ripped through
Jezebel uteruses without remorse all in the name of
Gynecology he mutilated Mammys Jezebels, and Sapphires butchering
their bodies, wiping away their humanity leaving behind medical stereotypes
that made him a hero for pulling life out and not putting life in, then he exhibited
their Black pain to the modern world of medicine as brilliant work, & not his crimes
IV.
Time (IS)
Toxic lighter fluid
Sprayed on— natural hair,
pretending all this Black doll texture
ain't a gift—crispy, burnt, creamy crack
Keratosis pilaris like a Popeyes chicken sandwich
all skinfolk ain't kinfolk—Loving, one drop-rule
Scalp on Fire—Texturism is a Firearms. Paradise is
novel hate, say less, Payless—Union's assault, don't talk
equity, radical feminism — then snatch my wig waterboarding
me by church and state. Say my name—Becky? Karen? Sorry,
can't find— Black hair products like an Unforgotten 51 hiding in—
plain sight like a Strange Fruit’s blood on the leaves. Say Black is beautiful
Shut Up, Rachel Dolezal. We must accept our crown nurture what's left safeguarding it with satin
V.
Time (IS)
Breaking apart at the seams like
an outdated pair of high water jeans,
living on borrowed time, stuck in a syndicated
TV show, tightly hugging a rear end praying that the
laugh track is #Blacktwitter laughing with me and not @
me. No one asks about my parents. You’ll know I was born
into the wrong family, that I feel forgotten and unimportant, Stephon
"Family Matters" at Carl’s house, and I long for a family where I truly matter,
a family that will never give up on me. I more than love the tv show character
Laura. No matter how much I test her patience, she will never, ever let go, Myra;
She knows I am a brilliant Black artist in need of a loving ungentrified inner-city home.
A home that feels like it was built for me, where my neighbors wave and don’t hide in fear of me.
Written by Charles Payne
Charles Payne won Arts + Literature Laboratory’s inaugural ALL Originals Prize for his poems "Dead End" and "Dinner with a Pig." This was his first national publication. Charles Payne is a Madison transplant, a certified teacher, and a self-taught social artist from Michigan. As a child, he loved hearing the sound of Paul Harvey's voice, their innate ability to describe every intricate detail truly inspired Charles to tell stories himself. And, yes, Charles can't wait to give you the rest of the story.
Read by Blue~Jay The Poet
Blue~Jay The Poet was Born and raised in two very different municipalities, Memphis, Tennessee, is their hometown, but they could say the same for Madison, Wisconsin. Blue~Jay’s tale of two cities grew up too fast and discovered from Maya Angelou that they have a voice no matter what cage they sing from, while Def Jam Poetry showed them how to be the voice they wanted to hear.