Injustice lives on
Made evident by our courts
Poverty and racism feed its hunger
Until blood is spilled to satisfy
Nothing changes, civil rights are a myth
Insinuated to please the skeptics
Then in one fell swoop
Yet another innocent dies with no justice served
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Round and round the story goes
One that’s as old as time
Where it stops nobody knows
Causing tensions to climb
These 50 odd years since civil rights
Have made so little change
Hatred between black and white
Festers like the mange
Fear of lynching may have passed
But fear exists no less
While walking the street they’re still harassed
No matter how finely dressed
Ask Sandra Bland or Michael Brown
Oh wait they cannot speak
Too many names buried in the ground
The future seems so bleak
Justify and deny all you wish
Your blindness it won’t erase
200 years by chains and switch
Like animals kept in place
Nothing has changed in modern day
Ask Eric, Tamir or Trayvon
It matters not what any of us say
Because either way they’re gone
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Repent!
There is no repentance,
There is no civility only cruelty.
The cud we chew is our own
Regurgitated repeatedly
Until even we believe the vile spew.
This once great nation has become caustic
Poisoning the lifeblood of its citizens.
O’ how embarrassed I am
To be counted amongst you.
What we viewed as progress
Proved to be nothing but a facade.
The world sees us
Just as ugly as our past portrays.
We fool no one with our mask;
Smiling with our hand outstretched in friendship
Whilst clutching a dagger behind our backs.
Then, with great surprise, things turn sour!
We gasp in horror at the cruelty of our adversaries,
Castigating those we exploit.
In denial we consider ourselves blameless
Arrogantly condemning our victims.
Their hatred runs deep and their memories are long.
As we learn not from our mistakes,
Repeated over and over we achieve the same result,
Setting ablaze modern day Rome,
And leaving its citizens to flee in horror.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Seeing the difference
In every face of color
White supremacy
Since this country’s inception
They have been looked down upon
Even in this day
Absolutely nothing’s changed
Life of denial
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
There is a war though weapons are words,
A rallying cry to ignorant herds,
Of who to fear and who to blame,
The right they do fire with venomous aim.
What progress we’d made seems now reversed,
Like empires of old we may now be cursed,
To end up in ruins under gluttonous rule,
Forgetting the history we learned in school.
Living in denial those culprits it serves,
Lying and deceiving with icy steel nerves.
All for more profits like parasites they leach,
Thriving in the fact that their money is speech.
Distracting the people with treacherous claim,
From Middle East to Mexico these people they blame,
For jobs leaving home and the state of our nation
By blustering and mongering and thunderous oration.
Their facts they are thin or nonexistent at all,
“Take back the country” their clarion call.
Take us back to where I wish they would tell,
To segregation and intolerance by the hatred they sell.
“Earlier times” only serves if you’re white,
Blacks and hispanics and Muslims must fight
To be looked in the eye and on even plain
With the privileged Americans that view them a stain.
If this be the direction the capitalists must take
On the backs of the common man they push til they break
Then revolution again must be waged to finally break free
From the tyranny of Monarchs they so want to be.
This is our duty and a citizen’s right
To question and challenge and bring wrongs to light,
For failure to do so is submission to rule
Painting you and I as nothing but fools.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Trembling with fear as he stood precariously on his tiptoes, the rope tightening with every stumble. Gerald could hear the sounds of laughter and chiding erupt behind him from the white-hooded cowards.
Why the uproar over the Stars and Bars? Because lynching was commonplace only a handful of decades ago.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
COMMENTARY:
It is very easy for one to dismiss the feelings of others when they have not walked in their shoes, especially if they are white.
It’s hard to believe, but up through the mid 1930s the hanging (lynching) of blacks in the deep south was not at all uncommon. This is certainly not long enough for the memory to fade as I’m certain that there are those still alive today that can remember the horrors of seeing or hearing about friends and loved ones who met their maker at the end of the racists noose.
We are fast to criticize the protests of an entire race of people because of a few bad apples, but this in my mind does not diminish the validity of their cause. Look black history in this country. They were not brought here of their own volition, they were enslaved for more than two centuries, then treated like second class citizens until the 1960s and many would claim that they still are right up until today. This I cannot dispute as I for one have never walked even a single day in their shoes.
Reaping what we sow;
Hatred only breeds hatred
As history proves.
See the neverending wars,
The eternal racism.
Turning a blind eye;
Pretending it doesn’t live
Does not make it true.
Ever since nine eleven
War has been never ceasing.
Ferguson…murder,
Baltimore, New York City
Charleston…again murder!
Racial hatred at its worst,
Plantation mentality.
This land of the free
Has sadly become a myth…
Just look at the news.
We are in shackles to war,
Racism, hatred and greed.
Sadly we don’t see
We are mice on the treadmill
Blindly taking bait.
I guess it really is true…
We are reaping what we’ve sown.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Laid to final rest
With a farewell and kind words.
Eulogies given;
The famous and powerful
Came to pay their last respects.
But is this enough,
We’ve been down this road before;
It’s paved with their blood.
Is this just more lip service
Paid to appease the people?
As the saying goes,
Actions speak louder than words,
This can’t be denied.
Maybe the edge has been reached
Finally putting an end to the hate.
Only time will tell
If these deaths have been for naught.
With man at the wheel
Anything is possible,
But I for one hope for change.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Confederate flag–
Symbol of our darkest time,
Human slavery.
Prideful in their ignorance
There are those still full of hate.
Don’t they understand,
There are wounds as yet unhealed–
Open and bleeding.
Each raising stings of poured salt
In an already deep gash.
I weep for their pain.
Have they not suffered enough
At your racist hands?
The shame is you don’t see it
Being blinded by false pride.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Darkness falls upon angel choir
Heaven mourns the funeral pyre.
Senseless death, skins evening shade
With their lives by hatred paid.
No justification nor reason exists
For racism and prejudice to persist.
The sixties clearly were not the end
For Black Lives Matter we must defend.
How sad it is hate thrives this day
Hunting others like birds of prey.
The south has risen, of this I fear
Though reason why is not so clear.
As house of God nor fortress strong
Could save their lives from evil long.
Nay, I did not know them, but it matters not
They did not deserve this deadly plot.
I mourn this day for humanities loss
As beautiful lives have paid the cost
Again and again hate rears its head
And every time folks wind up dead
Ask this question, if you think you can
Is this really the promised land?
For some perhaps, but others no
This is no sitcom or drama show.
These lives are real they’re flesh and blood
They need not perish in a godless flood.
Perhaps if we stand against hatreds rule
We’ll cast them down into the fiery pool.
And raise this nation into Heaven’s light
By doing what we know is truly right.
~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~
Dom DiFrancesco 