A PIVOT

by Imogen Arate

With you I am 

never alone

never in comfort

With me you 

have meaning

find purpose

A reflection of myself

an imprint

a ghost of the past

Your perpetual search

for mommy-

dearest Facts forsake

My forward motion

propelled by reenactment

of recurring cursed roles

you find reassurance

That devil you know

offers no surprises

I flee into the unknown

and you drag in fear

"Let’s go back”

You plead

“Let’s find comfort

in the familiar”

“Remember the good times”

“When I was the slave

and you the master”

Author's Note: I would like to acknowledge the influence Emma Rhodes’ “Johnny Depp Wins, and I Like So Many Others, Think of the Man Who Abused Me” had on my poem.

Imogen Arate is an award-winning Asian-American poet and writer and the Executive Producer and Host of Poets and Muses, a weekly poetry podcast that won second place at National Federation of Press Women's 2020 Communications Contest, where she has served as a national-level poetry judge in 2021 and 2022.  She often reacts to news in verse, which you can read here, on The New Verse News, as well as in other publications. You can find her @PoetsandMuses and @ImogenArate on Twitter and Instagram.

POEM FOR THE REST OF US

by Judy Juanita

“Last Saturday, a neighbor in Fort Worth called the city’s non-emergency line because he was concerned about his neighbors, 28-year-old Atatiana Jefferson and her 8-year-old nephew. It was the middle of the night, but her front door was open. The dispatcher sent police officers, who appear to have treated the call as a reported burglary. While searching the perimeter of the house, Officer Aaron Dean saw a figure in the window. Without announcing himself, he yelled ‘Put your hands up! Show me your hands!’ Two seconds later, he fired his gun, killing Jefferson in her own home.” —Radley Balko, The Washington Post, October 15, 2019. Photo: A makeshift memorial outside the home of Atatiana Jefferson on Monday. Jefferson was fatally shot by a Fort Worth police officer early Saturday morning. (Jake Bleiberg/AP via The Washington Post, October 15, 2019

We wear a masque called freedom
But Atatiana was shot like a fugitive slave.
We masquerade as upright citizens
Brave this deadly force every goddam day
Masquerade as independent thinkers
While our thoughts get shot down in the streets.

We believe, like true believers, in the rule of law
The gangs in blue shoot through that too.
Our red, white and blue masques say VOTER
But our ballots keep disappearing.
When the ancestors greet Atatiana
They shake her alive. The masquerade is over.

Faith leaders wear the masque of concern
But their brand-new bibles are warped and cracking.
Atatiana’s neighbor, in masque, cries out
They had no reason to come with guns drawn.
The ancestors ask: Are all the players numb?
Some, not all, though in costume, torn and dirtied, know.

The great pantomime and our long drawn out performance
Cracks and peels with every gun drawn and each bullet fired.

Judy Juanita's poetry has appeared in Obsidian II, 13th Moon, Painted Bride Quarterly, Croton Review, The Passaic Review, Lips, TheNewVerse.News, Poetry Monthly and Drumrevue 2000.  Her short stories and essays appear widely. Juanita's semi-autobiographical novel Virgin Soul chronicled a black female coming of age in the 60s who joins the Black Panther Party. Her collection of essays, DeFacto Feminism: Essays Straight Outta Oakland was a distinguished finalist in OSU's 2016 Non/Fiction Collection Prize.

BOXCUTTER BLUES

by Damian Balassone


They put me in these overalls
They put me in these shoes
Yeah, they put me in these overalls
They put me in these shoes
They handed me a Stanley knife
Said, ‘son it’s time to pay yer dues’

Well, the stock is rolling in
And the stock is rolling out
Yeah, the stock is rolling in
And the stock is rolling out
I’m walking like a branded slave
When all I wanna do is twist and shout

Well, mama get me outta here
This ain’t the life I choose
I said mama get me outta here
This ain’t the life I choose
I’m shackled to this factory
Lord, I got the boxcutter blues

Damian Balassone is an Australian poet whose work has appeared in over 100 publications, most notably in The New York Times.  He is the author of three volumes of poetry, including the forthcoming Strange Game in a Strange Land.

BALTIMORE CARGO

by Patricia Jakovich VanAmburg

Image source:  A Guide to the History of Slavery in Maryland (The Maryland State Archives, Annapolis MD and the University of Maryland College Park, MD)

Why did we not see cargo arriving
with the first slave ship whose
rotten timber roiled the harbor
leaving tobacco in our pockets…

cargo of manumission’s
low skilled “quasi-freedmen”
filling local factories for
twenty percent cheaper wages
and a city of transient pockets…

cargo of professional
“blood tub” rioters and
Know Nothing fraud
dividing a city until
free Blacks were pocketed
into segregated education…

cargo from World War II
steel Liberty Ships promising
jobs for thousands of poor
white southerners while
expanding corporate pockets…

cargo from decades
of racial blockbusting
depreciating neighborhoods
building heroin ghettos
bulging pockets of crime…

We should keep in mind
what we put in our pockets.


Patricia Jakovich VanAmburg teaches literature at Howard Community College in Columbia Maryland where she is also affiliated with The Little Patuxent Review. Her most recent chapbook is titled Watching for Birds.