didn’t do it
a negro needs to kill
something
trying to record
that this country must be
destroyed
if we are to live
must be destroyed if we are to live
must be destroyed if we are to live
Adulthood
(For Claudia)
i usta wonder who i’d be
when i was a little girl in indianapolis
sitting on doctors’ porches with post-dawn pre-debs
(wondering would my aunt drag me to church sunday)
i was meaningless
and i wondered if life
would give me a chance to mean
i found a new life in the withdrawal from all things
not like my image
when i was a teen-ager i usta sit
on front steps conversing
the gym teacher’s son with embryonic eyes
about the essential essence of the universe
(and other bullshit stuff)
recognizing the basic powerlessness of me
but then i went to college where i learned
that just because everything i was was unreal
i could be real and not just real through withdrawal
into emotional crosshairs or colored bourgeois
intellectual pretensions
but from involvement with things approaching reality
i could possibly have a life
so catatonic emotions and time wasting sex games
were replaced with functioning commitments to logic
and
necessity and the gray area was slowly darkened into
a Black thing
for a while progress was being made along with a certain
degree
of happiness cause i wrote a book and found a love
and organized a theatre and even gave some lectures on
Black history
and began to believe all good people could get
together and win without bloodshed
then
hammarskjo¨ld was killed
and lumumba was killed
and diem was killed
and kennedy was killed
and malcolm was killed
and evers was killed
and schwerner, chaney and goodman were killed
and liuzzo was killed
and stokely fled the country
and le roi was arrested
and rap was arrested
and pollard, thompson and cooper were killed
and king was killed
and kennedy was killed
and i sometimes wonder why i didn’t become a
debutante
sitting on porches, going to church all the time,
wondering
is my eye make-up on straight
or a withdrawn discoursing on the stars and moon
instead of a for real Black person who must now feel
and inflict
pain
From a Logical Point of View
I mean it’s only natural that if
water seeks its own level
The honkie would not bother with
Viet Nam
It’s unworthy of him
Cause they are not ready
for the revolutionary
advanced technology
that america is trying
to put on them
and nothing is worse
than a
dream deferred
It’s just those simple
agrarian people
trying to invoke
simple land
reform
and maybe bring
a new level
of consciousness
to their people
And here america is
trying
to teach them
how to
read and
write
and be
capitalists
when it’s fairly obvious
to the naked
untrained
eye
that they aren’t
ready
for meaningful
change
and the revolution
is only
in the honkies’
mind
I mean
if it was me
I wouldn’t
try to enlighten
those
slant-eyed
bastards
who only want
to sing and
dance
and be happy
all the time
I would have had enough fooling
around with niggers
I mean really
if I had at my
disposal
a means to get
out of this world
I’d go
and let those un
grateful
coloreds
try to get
along
without
me
Dreams
in my younger years
before i learned
black people aren’t
suppose to dream
i wanted to be
a raelet
and say “dr o wn d in my youn tears”
or “tal kin bout tal kin bout”
or marjorie hendricks and grind
all up against the mic
and scream
“baaaaaby nightandday
baaaaaby nightandday”
then as i grew and matured
i became more sensible
and decided i would
settle down
and just become
a sweet inspiration
Revolutionary Music
you’ve just got to dig sly
and the family stone
damn the words
you gonna be dancing to the music
james brown can go to
viet nam
or sing about whatever he
has to
since he already told
the honkie
“although you happy you better try
to get along
money won’t change you
but time is taking you on”
not to mention
doing a whole
song they can’t even snap
their fingers to
“good god! ugh!”
talking bout
“i got the feeling baby i got the feeling”
and “hey everybody let me tell you the news”
martha and the vandellas dancing in the streets
while shorty long is functioning at that junction
yeah we hip to that
aretha said they better
think
but she already said
“ain’t no way to love you”
(and you know she wasn’t talking to us)
and dig the o’jays asking “must i always be a stand in
for love”
i mean they say “i’m a fool for being myself”
While the might mighty impressions have told the
world
for once and for all
“We’re a Winner”
even our names—le roi has said—are together
impressions
temptations
supremes
delfonics
miracles
intruders (i mean intruders?)
not beatles and animals and white bad things like
young rascals and shit
we be digging all
our revolutionary music consciously or un
cause sam cooke said “a change is gonna come”
Beautiful Black Men
(With compliments and apologies to all not mentioned by name)
i wanta say just gotta say something
&
nbsp; bout those beautiful beautiful beautiful outasight
black men
with they afros
walking down the street
is the same ol danger
but a brand new pleasure
sitting on stoops, in bars, going to offices
running numbers, watching for their whores
preaching in churches, driving their hogs
walking their dogs, winking at me
in their fire red, lime green, burnt orange
royal blue tight tight pants that hug
what i like to hug
jerry butler, wilson pickett, the impressions
temptations, mighty mighty sly
don’t have to do anything but walk
on stage
and i scream and stamp and shout
see new breed men in breed alls
dashiki suits with shirts that match
the lining that complements the ties
that smile at the sandals
where dirty toes peek at me
and i scream and stamp and shout
for more beautiful beautiful beautiful
black men with outasight afros
Woman Poem
you see, my whole life
is tied up
to unhappiness
it’s father cooking breakfast
and me getting fat as a hog
or having no food
at all and father proving
his incompetence
again
i wish i knew how it would feel
to be free
it’s having a job
they won’t let you work
or no work at all
castrating me
(yes it happens to women too)
it’s a sex object if you’re pretty
and no love
or love and no sex if you’re fat
get back fat black woman be a mother
grandmother strong thing but not woman
gameswoman romantic woman love needer
man seeker dick eater sweat getter
fuck needing love seeking woman
it’s a hole in your shoe
and buying lil’ sis a dress
and her saying you shouldn’t
when you know
all too well—that you shouldn’t
but smiles are only something we give
to properly dressed social workers
not each other
only smiles of i know
your game sister
which isn’t really
a smile
joy is finding a pregnant roach
and squashing it
not finding someone to hold
let go get off get back don’t turn
me on you black dog
how dare you care
about me
you ain’t got no good sense
cause i ain’t shit you must be lower
than that to care
it’s a filthy house
with yesterday’s watermelon
and monday’s tears
cause true ladies don’t
know how to clean
it’s intellectual devastation
of everybody
to avoid emotional commitment
“yeah honey i would’ve married
him but he didn’t have no degree”
it’s knock-kneed mini-skirted
wig wearing died blond mamma’s scar
born dead my scorn your whore
rough heeled broken nailed powdered
face me
whose whole life is tied
up to unhappiness
cause it’s the only
for real thing
i
know
Ugly Honkies, or
The Election Game and How to Win It
ever notice how it’s only the ugly
honkies
who hate
like Hitler was an ugly dude
same with lyndon
ike nixon hhh wallace maddox
and all the governors of mississippi
and you don’t ever see a good-looking
cop
perhaps this only relates to the physical
nature of the beast
at best interesting for a beast
and never beautiful
by that black standard
if dracula came to town now
he’d look like daley
booing senator ribicoff
no pretty man himself
but at least out of the beast
category
yet all had to describe julian bond
as the handsome black legislator
which is, of course, redundant
life put muskie and huskie humphrey
on the cover
and we were struck by a thought:
“if we must be screwed—they could at least be pretty”
but the uglies kill
all the pretties
like john and bobby
and evers and king
and if caroline don’t look
out she’ll be next
arthur miller spoke of the white things
jumping wildly on their feet
banging their paws together
hating the young
only this time they were hating
their young
a salute to the chicago kids
now you and the world knows
we weren’t lying
a cracked skull in time
may save mine
(though i doubt it)
and hhh says we ought to quit pretending
what daley did was wrong
We aren’t pretending
We didn’t give a damn
you guys ought to get yourselves
together
eating your kids is a sexual
perversion
the politics of ’68 remind us grievously
of the politics of ’64
the deal to put the bird
and his faggoty flock in the white nest
(which began in dallas)
is being replayed and repaid
(the downpayment being made in los angeles)
with tricky dicky to win this time
(the final payment chicago)
cause there’s only two parties in this country
anti-nigger and pro-nigger
most of the pro-niggers are now dead
this second reconstruction is being aborted
as was the first
the pro-niggers council voting
the anti-niggers have guns
if we vote this season we ought to seek to make it
effective
the barrel of a gun is the best
voting machine
your best protest vote
is a dead honkie
much more effective than a yes
for gregory or cleaver
this negative bullshit
they run on us
is to tie us up in identification
“you don’t want nixon-agnew do you?”
“well vote for humphrey-muskie”
but all you honkies are alien
to me
and i reject the choice
it’s the same game they run
about nigeria
“whose side are you on?”
the black side, fool
how many times must i show that?
taking sides is identifying
and that is commitment
be committed to us
and don’t deal with them
as long as we choose one evil over another
(on some bullshit theory that it’s lesser)
we’ll have bullshit evil to deal with
let’s build a for real black thing
called revolution
known to revolutionists as
love
the obvi
ous need is a new liberal white party
to organize liberal and radical honkies
this will lessen but not remove the clear and present
danger
to us
we need to continue our fight to control
all of america
honkies are just not fit to rule
these are sorry but true facts—not one honkie is fit to
rule
the worst junkie or black businessman is more humane
than the best honkie
no black person would have allowed
his troops to be so slaughtered
and before you scream “king king”
his promise was your picture in the paper
and your head in bandages
mccarthy (the administration’s official dissident
candidate)
was not so honest
there are those who say he began with lyndon’s blessings
and the promise of good speaking engagements
and since we have witnessed the assassination of one who
didn’t need the money
or have the blessing
we are inclined to agree
and daley talked of teddy not making up his mind
he said no
that’s pretty definite
only it’s sad that once again
we have a chance we aren’t fully
utilizing
the honkies are at war to decide what to do
about us
and here we are
trying to get
into what every sensible person should be running
from
when we integrated the schools
they began moving away from public education
when we integrated the churches
they started the god is dead bit
now we’re integrating politics
and they’re moving to a police state
we ought to beat them to the punch
and pull off our coup
and take over, with arms and everything necessary,
our communities
post-election note:
those of us breathing easy now that wallace
wasn’t elected
check again
that’s gas you’re smelling
survival is still the name of the game
black people still our only allies
life or death still our only option
let’s me and you do that thing
please?
The Collected Poetry of Nikki Giovanni Page 7