Arsenic Lobster poetry journal
Issue Twenty-one
Winter 2009
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Amerikaz Nightmare
           --After Mobb Deep, Tupac and The Hughes Brothers
Kenyatta Rogers

I.

My father once said
“None of your friends will be racist.”
Me and my mother looked at him as if he were crazy,
like racism ended with the civil rights movement.

II.

It’s 1995 not 1965.
We’re doing practice drills,
coach goes to his office to get some extra basketballs,
we’re playing shirts vs. skins.
I’m a skin, and Brad is a shirt
he gets fancy with his crossover
trips himself, falls smacking his chin on the hardwood.
“Fucking nigger” directed at me.
The team comes between us
I couldn’t reach over fast enough.

III.

It’s 2005 not 1865.
I’ve got my right hand raised high,
holding that lambskin,
gold stamped on front,
crowd’s outside.
I’m in a black gown
the steps in front of me,
the push from behind,
the spit.
The run in suspenders
black steel toed boots.
I couldn’t reach.

IV.

My father once said
it’s possible to be young, black, and educated.
That’s America’s nightmare.
I’m Amerikaz Nightmare
Me and my mother told him he was crazy.

About Kenyatta Rogers

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