a hashtag
Another name
becomes another hashtag
Another life
comes to an end
and a number sign
is placed in front of a name
a life
becomes a death
becomes a number
We’re animals.
We want what we want.
We do what we want.
We
nurture
fuck
love
kill
what we want.
God’s basic creatures
of the Universe
or whatever.
but killing people
because of their skin color
is something
true
of
our
breed.
and I can’t seem
to swallow this.
I’m a gay man-
I’m queer.
And I've learned lessons
from certain marginalization.
but does that give me the right
to speak now.
I'm choking on my white privilege.
privilege I didn't earn
and I don't know what to do with.
so I write a poem
and another poem
I talk about it at lunch
I talk about it with my friends
I make a
social media post.
I use
Alton Sterling's
hashtag.
We’re connected
group texts
Our
telephones
capture
truths
“truths”
filtered
lives
Deaths.
We understand now
that’s it’s been this way.
Police
have a tendency
to kill
black people.
Confederate Flag
Black Lives Matter
This country’s history
but we’re still in it.
I see people smiling in selfies.
An art
that I enjoy
but I can’t do it today
and I don’t know how anyone can smile
today
it feels like
Orlando
Sandra Bland
Trayvon Martin
Sandy Hook
Columbine
but different
but the same
this is my basic gay millennial lyfe
and I don’t think I understood
fully
that this is still happening.
He tells me
to appreciate what we have
because tragedies happens every day
Is this what being an adult is suppose to feel like?
so I go back to taking a
because this is what I know
what I’ve gathered thus far
but sometimes truths consume you.
it’s like a right of passage
I can’t accept
it’s like a loss of innocence
that I’m fucking clinging to.
and it happened again.
Philando Castile's life
became a number
a number sign
put before his name
a hashtag.
