After the Storm

by Qwantu Amaru

Spring Cleaning

  The eyes are the windows into the houses of the soul.

  The wildness you see within these windowpanes is the loss of my control…

  …Of my consciences kitchen,

  Reeking from values long gone bad.

  The skeletons have left their closets,

  They’re running around like mad.

  Dirty thoughts dominate the wasterooms,

  The trash is piling high.

  I would clean them in the bathroom,

  but my hope’s water has run dry.

  My goals are dirty laundry,

  The washroom smells of their sweat and must,

  and I’ve lost my inner child,

  The game-room now only collects cobwebs and dust.

  Dishes of my deepest desires,

  Lie broken on the dining room table.

  My love life is long forgotten,

  The living room is little more now than a fable.

  The room once used for relaxation,

  Is now a den of nightmares.

  I’m losing my lease on life,

  Do you think the Realtor cares?

  Because I have a basement that’s flooding,

  From all of my lies.

  Aspirations I keep in the attic,

  Are finally saying their good-byes.

  I’m restless every night,

  I’ve made my bed but do you think I sleep?

  and my emotional toilet is overflowing,

  Revealing my inner sewage as I weep.

  I have viewed the many horrors of life,

  Dropping the property value of my soul.

  Did I mention that the thermostat is also broken,

  Inside it’s dry and cold…

  So you don’t want to get to know me,

  You see what I mean?

  At least not until I take some time and get a chance,

  To spring clean…

  Reality Check

  Image is nothing...

  But an ignorant impression,

  A blind perception without asking questions...

  Just a surface story of fictional glory,

  Lacking substantial evidence...

  Like electing presidents without background checks,

  and no one suspects...

  That underneath his smiling, posturing exterior,

  Is an inferior, wearier, warrior...

  Who everyday tries to ignore,

  The truth of his inner core...

  Too poor to try to cure,

  An illness ripe with malignancy...

  He begs for leniency, but only secretly,

  Because he’s been entangled by appearance...

  And only few ever receive clearance,

  To pass through the interference into the billowy depths within...

  These so-called friends,

  Still grin and smile at his jokes...

  Even as they peer through the hoax,

  The trick mirrors, screens of smoke, and lies that he spoke..

  Letting him choke on the fantastic fallacy,

  That one really gets everything one sees...

  In his solitude, this he decrees,

  From atop his throne of falsehood...

  Made out of petrified intentions of good, should, and would,

  His reality is but a dream...

  But even as the mirage begins to fade,

  There he remains and tries to stand...

  Until against his will and plans,

  The precious mirror crumbles into sand...

  Until Dawn

  Fleeting fireworks deepen the darkness’s descent upon the day

  Preparing the set of the world’s stage for this night’s play

  Starting with dress rehearsals of docile dreams

  Presented by opaque spotlights shining on black screens

  This prime-time lineup varies every night

  No one knows if the darkness will bring peace or if it will bring fright

  No matter which, unwilling window shoppers have no choice but to watch

  As Father Time moves the night onward notch by notch

  And billions of blind eyes staring out of mute faces

  Gaze upon the land of the lost and all its empty spaces

  Searching for the meanings of these midnight matinees

  In the realm of R.E.M., lord of the subconscious maze

  Trapped inside of this divine comedy, who understands the punch line

  When the Earth’s highest life form uses only ten percent of its mind

  And can’t even recall what makes escaping from the darkness so good

  It’s no wonder so many dreams are misunderstood

  For when they awake within the light at the end of night’s tunnel

  They think they are safe, but they have only reached the lip of the funnel

  Holding on for dear life for fear of falling off the edge

  It is now that they realize just how narrow is the ledge

  That separates them from that secret dark world

  Within which their deepest desires and darkest fears swirl

  For waking is a blessing not to be taken for granted

  From places where all normal logic is more than slightly slanted

  Nightmares serve as constant warnings

  That each and every sunrise seen really is a good morning

  Memory’s Bliss

  Life passes quickly as rapids to a waterfall

  And all that remains in the warped wreckage

  Of another soul passing over the edge

  Are thin glimmers of captured moments we leave behind

  On mantles and within albums in which we categorize our lives

  We haunt these images the way phantasms haunt final resting-places

  Our restless souls imprisoned behind the dusty covers of long forgotten books

  Hoping for the moment when we can reveal

  Cobwebbed stories about the days of our lives

  Speaking vicariously through the vocal cords of various freeze-frames

  We tell tall tales of joy, sadness, pain, and pleasure

  And as the flip books of frozen forgotten moments thaw

  We have been born again through a birth canal of dark rooms

  For a picture is much more than words alone

  But without an audience

  A picture is worth less than driftwood

  Floating aimlessly in the river of life

  the wall

  it’s called hitting the wall

  you’re running smoothly

  when suddenly your whole back

  tenses intensely

  as if some sick puppet master

  pulled all the muscles at once

  it’s more than a cramp

  and less than a charlie horse

  but it hurts like hell

  runners know this feeling well

  they call it hitting the wall

  or running the bear

  clawing and crawling on your back

  between laps he growls in your ear

  telling you that you can’t do it any more

  the finish line is too far

  you’re too sore

  to climb that wall

  that stands impassively in your way

  step by step the pain increases

  your legs have never felt this heavy

  nor your chest this hot

  inhaling napalm with each gasping breath

  forgetting about keeping pace

  even forgetting about the race

  because the pain is your only friend now

  and he sits atop that cold wall

  glaring down like humpty dumpty

  but it’s you that falls and cracks

  from the pressure

  and the ground has never felt this good

  so you decide to stay down

  and let the wall crumble and crush you />
  Sick & Tired

  see i've got this dis-ease

  i mean i'm uneasy see

  dtc drug advertising

  that be--direct to consumer

  directed at me

  is making me feel crazy...

  Do you sometimes feel lazy?

  voices in my tv be askin me

  tell lie vision harrasin me

  Are you sometimes sad or lonely?

  if i could only turn off these voices

  maybe pick up a magazine and read...

  Do you know what you need?

  i need ya'll to leave me be

  instead of tryin to convince me

  that somethings wrong wit me

  what's wrong with this society?

  we pop pills and pill pop

  to stop feelin anything

  Are you depressed?

  Are you in denial?

  Do you have trouble focusing?

  now i'm pacing through the halls of my life

  wondering when not if i'll have to go under the knife

  for ulcers or hemorroids or cancer or heartache or heartburn or wringworm or aids or myalgia or nostalgia or aneurism or amnesia or Alzeimer's or Graves or Parkinsons or Sanford and Sons...

  where the hell did all this dis-ease come from?

  Is your vision sometimes blurry?

  Do you have a medical history?

  that one is easy!

  i know more about my family's medical history

  than my own ancestry

  i can check all the boxes on that medical form

  sure i can tell you how i've coped with all this dis-ease since the day i was born

  There's a pill for that

  There's a name for that

  There's hope for that

  does insurance pay for that?

  will i die from that?

  will i die?

  will i?

  where does this dis-ease come from?

  was it in my food or drink? the tap water in my sink?

  preservatives

  pasteurization

  stress

  chemicals

  meat

  vegetables

  poisonous

  materials

  airborne

  genetic

  heredic

  alcohol

  tobacco

  bacteria

  hysteria

  Do you want the answers?

  yes...God yes!

  Ask your Doctor for more information

  For the Jena 6

  All together now

  Let's put up our fists

  We got to let them know

  That we won't stand for this

  Because racism is still alive

  And they just be concealing it

  Because the hatred that has poisoned us for so long

  Continues to persist

  Some people think this situation is outrageous

  Because 6 black kids put up their fists

  These must be the same people

  Who have sympathy for Don Imus

  All together now

  Let's put up our fists

  We got to let them know

  That we won't stand for this

  We've got a history of violence

  So don't try to claim ignorance

  Stop trying to dismiss this as an isolated incident

  Just check the statistics

  There you'll read

  About a system that punishes blacks disproportionately

  That's why we descended on your small backwoods town

  And this time we're going to stand our ground

  All together now

  Let's put up our fists

  We got to let them know

  That we won't stand for this

  And we will not leave until true justice is served

  These kids didn't receive the treatment they deserved

  Imagine the grief of coming to school and seeing that tree

  With three white nooses dangling

  Imagine the grief of spending 10 months locked up

  Charged with second degree murder and conspiracy

  Freedom becoming a memory with each days passing

  Now imagine a sea of thousands of black and white faces chanting

  All together now

  Let's put up our fists

  We got to let them know

  That we won't stand for this

  Work Shit (remix)

   

  Is it worth it?

  All this work shit?

  Let's put they game down flip it and reverse it

   

  Pops told me I should work to live

  and not live to work

  I guess that's a perk of the retired

  Meanwhile I'm sick and tired

  of being sick and...

  Well ya'll know the rest

  I wake up every morning and try my best

  To be better than the rest

  To set the curve on these corporate tests

  and to minimize my stress

  but these colonizers keep yo boy stressed

  Dressed in a monkey suit and expensive silk noose

  Working overtime to find the truth 

   

  And is it worth it?

  All this work shit?

  Let's put they game down flip it and reverse it

   

  I'm composing verses of rebellion

  Yelling silently from behind my computer screen

  Instead of making a scene and screaming out my frustration

  I should be calling Minister Farakhan and the nation of islam

  To swing by and drop a coupla X bombs on this God foresaken territory

  ya'll need to pray for me

  Cuz if my boss calls me into her office one more time

  I might just lose my mind

  And my job...

   

  But is it worth it?

  All this work shit?

  Let's put they game down flip and reverse it

   

  At the end of the day

  I wanna be able to look into the mirror and still see a trace of the nobility

  Passed on to me by the ancestors

  But the deeper I get into this corporate game

  I become more and more tame

  And I find myself laughing at jokes that ain't even funny

  Cuz i'm too busy watching my money rise in stacks

  Worrying more about my taxes than my people

  But lucky for me these lapses in judgment are temporary

  Cuz it's scary to think

  That I could be assimilating

  Imitating the ultimate imitators

  But that's the difference between action and words

   

  It's just not worth it

  All this work shit

  Let's put this game down flip it and reverse it

   

  So Mr. Bossman, Overseer, and Massa

  I guess I didn't pass your test

  Sorry I couldn't jump through the hoops

  I've decided to chill and go shoot some hoops

  I've decided to be a mentor to some kids groups

  I've decided to write some letters to our troops

  and tell them boys to come on back to this broken home

  I've decided to start my own business and struggle to pay off my loans

  But at least my choices will be my own

  Instead of making you and your kids and your kids kids rich

  I've decided that I just ain't built for this work shit

   

  So I quit.

   

  I put they game down flipped it and reversed it!

  I dare you

  what’s it gonna take to wake the sleeping masses?

  it’s like if there’s no movie stars, special effects or hot soundtrack no one gets affected

  we’re living in the ag
e of cause and cause

  there’s no more cause and effect

  do i gotta enlist Ben Affleck and that crazy duck from AFLAC?

  giving you daredevil insurance to crack through the lack of compassion

  whatever happened to compassion?

  i guess that intimate sentiment has gone bust

  leaving a great emptiness inside of us

  and we continue to feed it even though we can barely feel it

  we’re scared to peel it and uncover the juicy truth underneath

  because underneath it reeks of spoiled morality

  calloused and hardened by choosing everyday to look the other way

  whatever happened to color?

  everything’s turned cold and gray, blended together with a layer of smog on top

  in this environment

  cops get away with beating innocents

  innocence gets violated everyday on pay per view

  the newspaper is used not to report the news

  but as a vehicle to push the views of a chosen few upon me and you

  and we can smell the bullshit in the air

  that’s why we stay clear

  we’d rather cheer for a sports team than organize

  and start marching on every state capitol in these Divided States

  let me raise the stakes just a bit more

  not only did we start a war under false pretenses

  spending billions of your hard earned taxes to bolster our defenses

  but we said fuck you to other defenseless people

  like those in Darfur

  people being brutally murdered everyday

  the media can’t even spare five minutes of airplay to shine some light on their plight

  but maybe my expectations are too high

  maybe I’m being overly cynical and pessimistic

  FUCK THAT!

  it doesn’t get any more realistic than poor blacks and whites

  standing up to their necks in putrid pools of H2O

  looking up to the sky’s for hope

  only to see Mr. G. W. flying by, mai tai in hand

  trying to find a nice landing spot so he could stay dry

  but not even Katrina could get a full rise out of our numb demeanors

  we breathed a collective sigh of relief when the next news story took over the airwaves

  saving us from having to confront our deepest fears that our American society and social systems

  are so deeply fragile

  ask the people in the N.O. they know

  just how quickly disaster strikes

  but the rest of us have no clue

  and that cluelessness is the glow from an oblivious nightlight helping us sleep at night

  even knowing somewhere down below that our comfortable lives are nothing more than shimmering illusions

  as long as we keep choosing to be entertained rather than be aware

  it’s gonna get harder and harder to care about anything that doesn’t affect us directly

  and I suspect that even then

  even then, the social Novocain won’t wear off

  because we don’t want to wake up

  we don’t want to know what’s out there

  but here’s an idea

  maybe we’d do it on a dare?

  After the Storm

  It has been said that true joy can only be felt after experiencing true pain.

  Just as the colors of rainbows appear after the rain…

  The colorful mists are as temperamental as true feelings.

  Showing themselves only through prisms of personal reflection…

  When joy does reveal itself, it becomes as evident as raindrops on sunny days.

  Or as teardrops descending from smiling eyes…

  True happiness is the real treasure to be gained,

  From tormenting torrents of emotional rain…

  That in due time must subside,

  Revealing the soulful rainbow hiding inside…

 

  mic check…qwantu, qwantu (1,2…1,2)

  qwantu amaru (the lightbringer) is a current resident of new jersey and a beauty mark on the world's expansive face. born in pittsburgh, pennsylvania he has traveled the u.s. extensively and spent considerable time abroad as well.

  he wrote his first poem back in '98 about a love battle waged and lost and he's been using poetry to battle back ever since. complex and ever changing his writing took a significant leap forward upon joining the diverse and hard hitting backtalk! poetry troupe in 2001. somewhere between honing his craft as a passionate spoken word artist and attending florida a&m in the mba program he managed to graduate and someone actually hired this self described "conscious rebel".

  "we used to work for the massa, now i've got my masters, and i still work for the massa," he says of his experience working the commercial plantations of corporate america. not letting anything stop him, qwantu is in process of completing his first supernatural suspense novel.

  qwantu describes his spoken word flow as "stream of consciousness poetic truth". for more information visit the black on black rhyme website at www.blackonblackrhyme.com or e-mail him at qwantu@hotmail.com.