Born November 20, 1942.
Inaugurated on January 20, 2021.
Born June 14, 1946.
Inaugurated on January 20, 2017.
Ruby Bridges: Born September 8, 1954.
First day in a white classroom on November 14, 1960.
Angela Davis: Born January 26, 1944.
Became the third Woman on the fbi’s most wanted list on August 18, 1970.
Released on bail after 16 months of incarceration on February 23, 1972.
Acquitted of all charges by an all-white jury on June 4, 1972.
Marsha P. Johnson: Born August 24, 1945.
Stonewalled the nypd on June 28, 1969.
The nypd ruled Marsha’s death a suicide on July 6, 1992.
Martin Luther King Jr: Born January 15, 1929.
Had a dream on August 28, 1963.
Went to the mountaintop on April 3, 1968.
Assassinated by white supremacists on April 4, 1968.
Emmett Till: Born July 25, 1941.
Whistled at a white girl on August 28, 1955.
He was two years older than
Tamir Rice: Born June 25, 2002.
Murdered by a white man with a badge on November 22, 2014.
jim crow: Born Juneteenth, 1865.
just won’t fucking
die
I imagine that mista past president has sat
underneath palms in the Middle East
but has never tasted the warm sweetness
of a date
can’t bring himself to put his lips on
Worn Leather and Scar Tissue and Age Lines
and Exhaustion and Folk Music and Survival
classrooms shove dates down my throat
put their hands over my mouth
so I have to swallow
don’t even prepare ‘em right
leave pits in my stomach
forget the date came from the tree
came from the seed
came from the pit
came from the date
which is to say that linearity and
history are both constructed.
what is a date
without person and place?
time does not march forward
unless we do
I hold a date in the palm of my hand
sink my teeth into it
bite down into the gooey, sticky sweetness
savor the moment
write my own History
write my own poem
call this a radical act
