Tupac Amaru Shakur vs 2Pac

I woke up this morning thinking about Pac. I really miss 'Pac. I felt a kinship with him that continues to this day. He articulated so well my feelings about many things. He was the only person who could reach directly in our hearts and show us what is most beautiful about us and also what is most ugly. It wasn't only that, but it was this feeling that I have of being born 30 years too late. I feel like an anachronism. I look around at my people, at poor people in general and I want to do so much more than I am doing to help folks lift themselves up from where they are. But I wasn't born in 1940, 50 or 60. I was born in 1970 and I know what I know for a reason. It's frustrating to look around and it seems the masses have forgotten so much, that all of us, or most of us are just paper chasing and not paying attention to our brothers and sisters struggling. People are trying so hard to forget New Orleans and the Gulf Coast and what Katrina did, but how can we? That was the problem in the first place, those of us who made it through the traps of poverty, we forgot to bring the rest of our people along with us. How would Pac have reacted? I am quite sure that he would have blown up at President Bush way worse than Kanye did (see Letter to the President) and I am also certain that he would have been among the first people on the ground, putting his body and whatever resources he had available to bear on the situation. Pac would have been there helping people, not just talking about how fucked up it was that no one was helping. That spirit is the Panther Baby in him. I am ashamed that I haven't been doing more, but it is also true that no matter how much any one of us does, we can always give more. Angela Davis told me one time that the challenge was not to die for the revolution, but to live for the revolution.

Pac was such a complex person. I never knew him personally, but he was much more to me than a celebrity. To me, Pac was a spokesman for all the little Black boys who grew up in revolutionary households and found Hip Hop as a way to express our passions and live our lives. I miss that cat, and I hate the fact that noone has been brave enough to tell the truth, whatever that is about why he was murdered. Why did he have to die? I am fairly sure that Suge Knight and the Mafia had everything to do with it. I am no one famous, so Ima say what I feel. Suge profited from Pacs death, and the whole rest of the world lost a leader. He wasn't just a rapper or actor, he was a leader.

He wasn't perfect or all clean and tidy. He was messy as hell, he made stupid mistakes, he made people angry, he said and did hurtful things, but I think in retrospect we can all see that he was a young man trying to grow and deal with the contradiction of what he knew to be right and the attraction of what my friend Malachi calls "the Shiny Things."

When you grow up poor, when you get older and able to not live day to day, a lot of us want the shiny things. We know that money doesn't equal happiness, but we don't want to live like that ever again. It must be hard to find the balance. I think a lot of rappers just swing all the way far out. I don't know, I'm still broke and struggling. I want to know what it is like not to have to struggle, and I am determined to get there. They say that money changes people, and I tell myself that I am strong enough to resist the temptation, but damn.

The other thing is that dealing with Black people, Americans in general, is that wealth is a validator. If you have money, you have more personal authority than you do if you're broke. If I had walked up in front of those kids @ Mission High with hella bling on, a fur coat and a grill then they would have been sitting up in their seats to see what the hell I was talking about. Instead, I had on some dusty Timberlands, a dashiki and last years LRG jeans. But what I had to say and how I said it grabbed them. If I ever get it like that, I won't be Slick Rick with mine. I'm thinking more De La Soul 88....

In any case, Pac must've known that. He knew the people he wanted attention from the most listened better when he was profiling and high siding. I have heard so many rappers say that you have to hide the lesson in the music, or put the sugar in with the salt if you want people to listen. I think differently though, I think people want the truth, but they want to be able to forget about how painful their lives can be and shake their ass. There is nothing wrong with that, everybody like to shake their ass. We can't just walk around brain numb and forget that we need to take some responsibility and be about the business of making this a better world for those living and those to come.

I'm out folks. I'm taking some kids to Yuerba Buena gardens tomorrow to see the Black Panther exhibit.

Peace and Love,
M

Mission High School

I was at Mission High yesterday. I got to be the prerequisite "adult voice of reason" at a youth talent show. It really was great. My job, along with WWS magazine and Emaculent entertainment put on a High School Talent show, along with HoodStarz and Mistah FAB. I know that when I walked up to the podium, the youth (along with some of the judges, parents and teachers) were like "who is this nigga in a dashiki and suit jacket?" But once I got started, I went some other place, I really felt as if I was standing outside my body and listening to someone else. I was being used, I had notes that I followed, but I had prayed before that He give me something to touch these youth, to really get to their hearts, and I think I did.
It felt great. I opened with a poem "History" and I closed with "Freedom Fighter"
I want to do as much of that kind of stuff as I can. I met some people there, I think good things will come out of it.

I can never get past how indredibly beautiful it is to see young people happy and dancing. There was a few times when the kids just mobbed the stage, going dumb, getting hyphy, and generally just dancing their asses off. These kids mean mug so much always walking around looking unhappy, any time we can get them to smile and just be kids is like gold.

Power to those who bring Peace to the kids

My Rant

Black America is still under attack and Racism is still very much alive. Strong statements to make, but absolutely true. The recent threats of lawsuits against institutions of higher education and the dismal trend of black male incarceration and low achievement should be red flags to anyone seeking to gauge the health of the Black community.

Access to higher education has always been viewed as the way to true independence in not only the African American community, but to the whole nation. Our greatest leaders have stressed that education is the one thing, that once gained, cannot be taken away from us. Now that access is being limited once again by distributing funds once earmarked for aspiring African American Scholars, to the general student body. Why? Because the perception is that too much preference is being given to African Americans in awarding scholarship funds and that the historical effects of racism have been overcome.
The African American community has been under a consistent attack since we arrived here on these shores. Slavery, Jim Crow, a bungled attempt at integration, The Crack and HIV/AIDS epidemics, The 3 strikes laws, all these factors have had a devastating effect on our community. Our students locally have a dropout rate that has been estimated as high as 70%.

I know from my work with young people that the perception is that their opportunities are limited. The reality may be different, but somewhere along the way, the fact that they can be anything they want to be, achieve any goal that they can visualize has been lost on them. Our young people go to schools where they are met with low expectations by the school administrations and reactions ranging from amusement to hostility from the student bodies. Our young people are our most precious resource, yet we send them to places to be educated that have a dismal track record at successfully preparing our youth.

Now, the ones that do manage to make it through are being faced with the fewer resources to finance their educations. The commitment to equity and parity in this nation has been reneged on. The myriad problems of African Americans cannot be solved by any government program or initiative, but only by our own selves as African Americans. The American public must recognize though, that many of the problems that face our community were not internally generated, but created by our original status as slaves and then second class citizens. In truth, we have only been full citizens for 41 years, since the 1965 Voting Rights Act. We can not as a nation, realistically expect the effects of 346 years of institutional racism, economic deprivation and mental warfare against our community to be ameliorated in 41 years. That would be ridiculous. The problems of African Americans are the problems that America as a Nation created for us. We as African Americans are responsible for healing ourselves and our community but no one should be fooled into thinking that we are in this sad condition on our own accord.

Affirmative Action, targeted scholarships, increased academic support, specialized schools, alternative sentencing, early intervention, and mental health supports, economic incentives, parenting classes, all these things and more are desperately needed to repair the damage done to the African American community. As citizens our first impulse has been to look to the government for assistance, but we cannot expect the government to serve our needs particularly at a time when America is being referred to as “The Homeland” and we as African Americans are being pitted against our immigrant brown brothers and sisters who are being used as cheap labor just as we were. If America were my homeland then my children would be treated well. America is still treating African Americans as unwelcome immigrants. Other immigrant groups have come to this Nation and used their own internal resources to build strong communities; we have started, stalled and stopped at this endeavor several times. We hold the solutions to our own problems. We must look first to ourselves and create our own solutions. If we want our children to be successful students then we should create environments where they can learn.

We have created these structures in the past and many of them still exist today. I attended two such schools as a young student. The first was Nairobi Day School, a community run school in East Palo Alto, California. The classes were small, the students were all given indivualized attention and expectations were high. The other was Ivy Leaf School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The approach was a little different, Ivy Leaf was a private school and Nairobi Day School was a community school, but the emphasis on learning and the expectations of excellence were not. What made those schools different was not only their Afro Centric curriculum, what made those schools different is that the teachers genuinely knew all of the students in the school, and that they treated us with love and respect. They took the time to engage us as people, to respect each and every one of us as learners.
I work with young people who have very marginal grades, as an instructor at an after school program in Menlo Park, California. I am always surprised that these brilliant young minds are not performing any where near their potential in their schools. Sure, they know that they have to get good grades, but they often tell me that what makes the environment that I create for them different from their schools is that their teachers do not care about them. They do not take the time to learn them as people. I tell my students that it’s unfair, but unfortunately, that is the way life is. Very few people will take the time to get to know them as people. When educators take the time to authentically engage these young people and take the time to create positive learning environments for the youth, great things happen. All of a sudden, it’s not so important that they’re cool. It

We should learn from our Asian and Latino brethren and create economic and educational institutions that work to our benefit and we must do the internal work that is necessary to defeat the plague of self hatred caused by the 389 years of warfare that this country has waged against us. My namesake, Malcolm X put it best when he said “Just because you sit at the table does not make you a diner.”

Faith

is the sustaining element in my life. I think sometimes about how hard life is, how unfair, but less and less I dwell on that. Life is Hard, that's all there is to it. There is suffering in life, and it is not that we suffer, we all suffer. I think the test is how we handle our suffering that measures us.

I had an interesting discussion with an older friend of mine recently and he basically said that there are people who just need to accept that others are going to dump their own shit on us, their anxieties, anger, whatever. He says that part of being a man is learning to accept that sometimes we need to be on the receiving end of all that bullshit and just learn to let it end with us. At first, I didn't want to hear it, but the more I thought about it, the more sense it makes.

We all deserve happiness, each and every single one of us deserves to be happy contented fulfilled human beings.

Most Holy Father
Help me to be brave enough to follow my path. Give me voice enough to properly say what I feel is right. Give me the courage oh Father, to make a stand when it is right and to stand silent when I have to. Help me to make my mind restful enough to hear Your loving voice.
In your most Divine Mercy, allow me to never feel the negative emotion we call "hate."
Please don’t let me ever forget the struggles that produced me. Let all my senses and my mind forever be alert and open to positive change. Let me learn to further accept the obstacles that are placed before me and let me overcome them with dignity and grace. Let my entire self create work that embodies truth and love and allow my work to be an inspiration for all who regard them I pray for these things so that I may continue to do the work that you would have me do.
Amen

Hard Days and Nights

I hate being single. nuff said.
Peace to the Peaceful
-M

I Am Because We Are

"I Am Because We Are" is the mantra by which I try to live my life. The way it was explained to me is that this statement is a basic summation of African traditional beliefs.
My own personal state is directly reflective of the state of my community, of my people. The whole statement is "I am because we are. We are, therefore, I am" If we as a people are doing well, then I do well also.
I try to live this out as best I can. I teach, I work in the community so that I can share what knowledge I have gained in life with the youth. And as I teach, I also learn. The kids share language with me, they share culture and they share practical knowledge.
As I learn and grow I become a better teacher and learner.
Peace to the Peaceful
M

B Boys

b boys
We b cookie cutouts
Bboy
Black revolutionary
Tupac ologists
Ride for ours
Day and Night
Night and Day
We West Coast East Coast Midwest Downsouth to overseas
Us be them that light the world on fire

We roll it up
Smoke it
Leave a trail behind us
Blaze one for all to follow
We put it in the air

Believe that
Because we be that
We is them
Bboys

Cookie cutter
Black revolutionaries
Give high fives to my niggas
On the block
Doin it
Us set fire to minds
And flesh if necessary

Remix-wait for the
Remix they brewin right now in
K to Eights
Worldwide
It’s going to be so fucking cold….
We be cookie cutter
Bboy revolutionaries

Dance furiously
Tear the roof off this motherfuckerwe don’t need no water…..

Us light up the night with our bodies and voices
Dance so hard our sweat glisten and glow
We shinin-no diamonds needed
We bold, we strong, we cold
We leave our names on walls
Our stories fly through the air And our love is eternal.

Penetrate

Penetrate

I want to penetrate you
Titillate, tickle and pleasure you
Until you reveal all of your soft mysteries

I want to see you unfold before me
You, the beautiful flower from some Mexican desert
Looking at you, I can see the spines, but I smell your nectar
and I just can’t seem to stay away
-I keep getting pricked and stung

I want to penetrate you
Caress you, be inside you
You are closed
But I believe that I have the key
Designed solely to unlock the oceans inside you

I want to penetrate you
Caress you
Be inside you
I want to tap, tap, tap
Tap, tap, tap
Tap, tap, tap
At the gates of you gently
Until you release your secret hidden nectar
Let it flow all over me, onto my fingers and hands into my mouth
Let me taste you.

Hold me inside your mouth
Taste you on me
Feel me deep inside you
Hold me in the deepest parts of you
Where only I have been
That place where you and I are one.

Let me in.

charcoal-a poem

charcoal
I said I was dark chocolate
And she laughed and said
“charcoal”
and suddenly she was not my girlfriend anymore

She was one of those little kids
Who teased me about staying in the oven too long
Or said my momma got pregnant by the tar baby
Or called me “The Creature From The Black Lagoon”

She said I was charcoal when I said I was chocolate
And then she had the nerve to think she was funny
It hurt, because suddenly she was not my girlfriend
But just some insensitive white person who went too far

Who didn’t understand that some jokes aren’t funny out of the mouths of white folks, at least not to me

But this is not really about her
Because I thought I was over it
I’ve gone through all the steps
Over and over about why I am chocolate,
Not charcoal.
I thought that it wouldn’t hurt, being called charcoal, but it does.

No matter how many Micheal Jordans, Denzels, Morris Chestnuts, no matter how many Don Cheadles I see,
Somewhere I am still the Creature from the Black Lagoon, still the mixed baby of a dark woman and the Tar Baby
The last boy to be picked to dance by the pretty girls, the brother whose name is always forgotten; “aren’t you so and so’s cousin?”
The one in the bathroom mirror trying to hard bristle brush my nappy ass hair into waves

I am charcoal, hard burned up, carbonized, utilitarian, a throwaway disposable item useful only for one or two things

Not Dark chocolate, something sweet and savory, to be looked forward to with anticipation, Something savored and treasured. A delight for the senses.

I thought I was chocolate and the woman who I thought both loved and understood me told me I was charcoal and laughed. Not even realizing what she just said.

But maybe I am charcoal because under pressure, A hard lump of utilitarian dark ass charcoal will become a diamond

And I been under pressure a long time.
I think I qualify
So yes I am charcoal.
And soon whether you see it or not,
Whether you think it is okay or not,
I will be a diamond.

Had a Birthday

My 36th and I have to tell you. It was great.
Peace to the Peaceful
-M

Closer to my dreams

One of the things I promised my Aunt Mary I would do with my life is that I would pursue my writing. I am almost finished, I can taste it. I have enough material, text anyway to publish my book right now, but I want it to be the best it can be for all the resources I have at hand. Which means that I have to use that hustle muscle I was talking about earlier.
I just spent a few hours pulling stuff together. I have 125 solid poems and 20 essays (they need to be polished). I am almost there, family.
It means a lot to me to get this out there to the people. It's just all in my head right now, but I can't tell you how weird it is to see my work that I have everywhere, in binders, notebooks, napkins, etc. all collected into anything cohesive. I just started advertising for graphic artists and book designers to find someone who can help me make this thing really pop. Once I get this off the ground, I am going to pour this energy into my non profit. IABWA. Monday the 13th is my 36th birthday. Damn. I am growing up so fast, I'm getting dizzy. About damn time.

Power 2 the Peaceful
M

Hustle Muscle

is my term. Don't try to jack it. The Hustle Muscle is your brain and your drive to succeed. Every single one of us has a gift, something that the Creator endowed us with that enables us to prosper. Using your hustle muscle to get ahead and on top of whatever you need to get on top of is what the good Lord intended for you, so get off yo' ass and be about yo' bidness!

Power to the Peaceful

More Poetry

Bleed
We bad
Some Niggas is so tough
Ruffle feathers like bad weather
Bad news
Niggas want to fight so bad
Our blood be boiling
Be wanting to
Lock hands
Put it on somebody

We really want to fuck some shit up

But what is that gon’ do?
How we gon’ handle this?

Blood gon’ be shed
Somebody going to jail
And Somebody else going to the hospital
Stab wounds, gunshots, take a long time to heal
But not as long as our spirits will take
Spirits will long remember
What these feet and fists feel like
Balled up made hard for contact against soft flesh
We will long remember what it feels like to have stomach folded over feet
Head buzzing
Blood in our mouths
Ears and face hot
So damn hot
We will long remember
The burn of the bullets
Bodies’ fight against hot lead
45 and nine millis

Our spirits will not forget
This violence, this basic betrayal
Of what is best about us

Why we forgot how to come back from the place
Where our words don’t work
So we ride back to the words on one anothers’ pain

And so it goes:
“Bleed nigga bleed! Bleed nigga, nigga bleed! Nigga Bleed till you and I die. Nigga bleed till we die. Nigga bleed”
Nigga, I want you to bleed for me,
Your blood sacrifice is going to be my penance,
You on the cross me for me and everybody like me.
I need to forget so I am going to make you bleed,I am going to take it out on your flesh
Until I cant shoot no more
Until I can’t beat you no more
Until you can’t breathe no more