Your Poetry Dot Com - L-I-S-T-E-N

Can you picture this?
Peace, love, beauty, and bliss?
Can you fast forward?
And see a fist?
Pounding
Screaming for black power amiss?
Back to the bliss
People living together in love
Not bothering anyone
Nothing closer than blood
Man comes home
From hard day at work
Too see his whole family
Laying in dirt
White men
Throwing the whole village around
Puts the heart on the boat
And burns the village down
Short Hell later
We find ourselves on new land
It seems
The power in charge
Is the white man
He screams and pushes us around
Now
I’m in the weeds
Throwing hoes in the ground
He repeats a word
I think it’s called Nigger
But I can feel the hate from his mouth
Insulting my way of living
Slavery is over
But they still have a way
To put us down
A word that incites violence
When it utters a sound
Bottled in frustration
Trying to get a job
But these Jim Crow Laws
Is sparking angry mobs
Even though we’re legally
No longer slaves
Equality and justice
Is something over we slave
Some people are bitter
Stuck in their ways
Wish they could go back
To the good ol’ days
When hard work was done
Without retort
And our nation was thriving
Off im-
And exports
They can’t stand
To see us walking down the street
And a mere whistle from Emmit
Can get you swept off your feet
So they came with a form of harassment
No one could beat
The system wasn’t enough
So they came with the heat
Nigger
Takes us back to the day
With Abraham Lincoln
Playing the White House game
Less than nothing
As valuable as the dirt we were plucking
But retaliation
Anywhere south of Kentucky?
If your mother got your body back
You were considered lucky
Fast forward
Now the word is used day to day
As if some new
Hip hop
Way of slang
When I see my buddy
If I shout it with an A!
Apparently the root of the word
Is taken away
A term of endearment
Something only we can say
But if a white person says it
The love is taken away
Its offensive
Reason for young people to fight
But said the same word
36 times last night!
Tell me
How is this any different
From racism?
To say one group of people
Ain’t equal
Because the sequel
Of a word
Is not as violent as the prequel
But if the white people say it
It has to be the prequel
Offensive
For black people
It has to be the sequel
Racism
A meaning of a word does not change
Depending on the color of his lips
Of which they are saying
If its offensive in the first place
Its offensive to all!
If it’s a term of endearment
Then it’s a term for all!
Be consistent
Reconsider
But what do you do
When its someone’s way of living?
When they portray themselves
As the glamorous life of a thug
I personally
Call a spade a spade
And a flush a flush
If the word is a term of endearment
Then why is it used
To refer to a minority
Acting a fool?
Which one is it?
One side wants to say
That’s what I call my true friends
That I will ride for
Until the day my life ends
Now that’s real
STOP BEING BIASED
Now that’s real
They summed up love for another
In one word
One feel
They took something ugly
And changed it to something to call each other
To show I will die for you
And we will die for each other
NOW THAT’S REAL
Old people get mad if you want
But we listened to your side
The least you can do
Is to listen to us
AND I MEAN L-I-S-T-E-N
My only problem with this
Young way of looking at it
Is when white people say the same thing
They have to creep
Like they’re in the attic
Trying not to wake up
Good ol’ Uncle Larry
The grown people look at it completely different
The root of the word
Is too ugly
To be used in public
The hatred behind
A word to put us down
Can not be changed
Or twist around
It’s just another way to divide the generation
Like the rap battle
Pants battle
And simple etiquette basics
How do I feel?
I’m not quite sure!
But these grown people can’t be so single minded!
To have a funeral for the word!
And us young people have to understand
If it offends some people that much
Maybe it should just be put away
Here’s my opinion
This conflict will never be solved
Because it’s a fight between
Grown people that think they know everything
And young people nothing
That they’re right
So they won’t truly L-I-S-T-E-N
And young people
That can’t articulate and penetrate
The mind of a renegade
I’ve always been a very open minded person
And I can see the good behind the word
The honest attempts
To do nothing worse
Then say a trendy word
But I can’t get on
For attacking white people
For saying the same thing
And the hurt and pain it brings others
Is not equal to the other thing
So no
I don’t think we should say the word
Not because its as TERRIBLE as its made out to be
But it bothers others to the point
Of violence and PERIL that is not necessary to be

This poem is Copyright ยฉ B-eezy313