You are here

In front of the Mona Lisa

Provoking six million gags a year

Dismissing she’s da Vinci in drag

 

You are here

So valuable she can’t be insured

Sfumato eyes and slanted smile

Dangle like sneakers…. on a pole

 

I can hear you thinking

You are here

You are here

You are here

You are here

Bored with near misses and boors

And the fealty of Jim Crow fifty years ago

Riding a labyrinth carousel in the wilderness

You are here…  before the fiery furnace

 

Freedom not long actually happened

While you were sleeping unaccountable

Transfixed on transitions a half-century ago

Don’t pretend you know what’s going on

 

We are here beyond the status quo

Beyond owning cable movies until 2024

Beyond the fear of dread before joy

Where do we go from here?

 

I know, they know, he knows, she knows

Like assumptions on the street is folly

Free your children what can you do for them?

Who are we?

 

Where conceptions… are constructions

Subject to… demystifications

Like symbols are… adroit for points

Take your children… Over there!

  

Over there

Away from you

Away from me

Away from them

Away from he

Away from she

Who are we?

Freedom!

 

You are here

 

Over there

Away from you

Away from me

Away from them

Away from he

Away from she

Who are we?

Free them!

 

There are non-profit-tax-exempt boarding schools

For girls and boys who would die on the fourth of July

Because snitches get stitches and fathers disappear

It was an easy sale – – – –

 

Wooed scholars thinkers and Morehouse men

With paeans and promises for the liberal emergence of altruism

With curriculums and schools of thought designed by them

It was an easier sale – – – –

 

Bernanke, Chomsky, Aslan, Witten

Micheaux, Baldwin, Davis, Marsalis

Thompson, Sir Timothy, Nash – – – –

Gates, Plato, Picasso, and Sowell

 

Over there where students create Kickstarter projects

Before the class trip to Paris, France in the fall

Parents watch their children dance under the balustrade

On the sunken floor after the Science Fair on Saturday morn

 

Where conceptions… are constructions

Subject to… demystifications

Like symbols are… adroit for points

Take your children… Over there!

 

Over there

Away from you

Away from me

Away from them

Away from he

Away from she

Who are we?

Freedom!

 

You are here

 

Over there

Away from you

Away from me

Away from them

Away from he

Away from she

Who are we?

Free them!

 

Cunning like military brats have to be

Wearing class A red cardigans and purity rings

Watching Venus north of the crescent moon in the dome

Reengineering the next generation

 

I called myself a Ghost writer

I never claimed to be one

But Talking heads and Rhodes Scholars

Join the flute girls at the grog bowl serving sharp edges and chum

 

This life is a bizarro disinvestment

But, before you head home by GPS

Where the last honest man is on video

Here’s a bar and verse… for the road

 

Our Father who art in heaven – – – – 

Hallowed be your name

Thy kingdom come

Thy will be done

On earth

As it is in heaven – – – –

 

Where God given gifts are never squandered

You are here in the foyer with problem and solution

Where common sense is not enough

Where who and what is forever kitschy

Affirmation is a function of negation and vice versa*

Social constructs are under siege and should be

Where talking heads shut the fuck up!

 

Free them!

 

You’re welcome to stay for Church

Or join Yogi… Temple

 

Copyright ©2015 by E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

*Octavio Paz