Post the Tenth 2 or Remembering Trayvon

The judges gavel cracks

My head split in two

Not

Guilty

Innocent slain

Yet cleared of all charges

One more drop

In a swift moving river of blood

–

But this drop

Is an ocean

An expanse stretching back 500 years

Not the first nor the last

A steady stream of souls

Every 28 hours released

Slain

In cold blood

By jackals who fear majesty

–

He was just a boy

And we were just children watching

A farce on the screen

Knock knock

Whose there?

Motherfucker

His life was not a joke

And this is not justice

This is a travesty

A tragedy branded upon our scalps

I ask myself

Are you human?

Are you made of rock?

How do you not see this black boy slain

How do you not SEE

Take your face and press it against the glass

Of his coffin

Grab you by the wrist and force your hands to feel

The stillness of his chest

Pull your eyes open and show you what it looks like

To mourn life

–

I am driven mad

By this wondering

The knot in my throat

Pushing me to desperation

How is your heart so cold

Your mind so calloused

Your conscious so numb

That you don’t see these lives

Human

6 women

Representative of our world

That sees blackness

And cowers in perpetual fear

Sees blackness and thinks

Criminal

But they are not the ones

Who crossed the ocean

To burn and steal and kill

They are not the ones

Who subjugated whole people

They are not the criminals

These 6 women

And the lawyers

And the judges

And their whiteness

Are the criminals

Murderers all

Whiteness is a hell of a drug

–

But I refuse

To lose any more sleep

Worrying about white people

They don’t deserve my energy

Today

I worry about my Black sisters and brothers

Today

I wonder how we can eradicate anti-blackness

In our communities

In myself

Today

I will do what I can to keep my lover safe

Today

I remember Trayvon

Today

I fight for Trayvon

Locked Up and Left Behind: New York’s Prisoners and Hurricane Irene (via Solitary Watch)

Oh good, the Prison-Industrial Complex and those in power are fucking over the under served. Surprise Surprise.

"We are not evacuating Rikers Island," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in a news conference this afternoon. Bloomberg annouced a host  of extreme measures being taken by New York City in preparation for the arrival of Hurricane Irene, including a shutdown of the public transit system and the unprecedented mandatory evacuation of some 250,000 people from low-lying areas. But in response to a reporter's question, the mayor stated in no uncertain terms … Read More

via Solitary Watch

Post the First or On How The Personal is Politcal

Greetings and Salutations! My name is Morgan and I’m a 21 year old transwoman. This is my first blog so I don’t really know what I’m doing but that’s the fun part!! In this first post I think I want to discuss for a bit how the personal is political for me and the point of this blog.

Just as a caveat before I begin, all of the things in this blog are based on my experience and my experience alone unless otherwise specified. I do not claim to speak for an whole community and if you expect me to then you need to educate yourself. If it sounds like I’m speaking for a whole community than I ask that my siblings in social justice call me out on it.

Before we begin this discussion let us first define some terms.

per·son·al

[pur-suh-nl]

–adjective 1. of, pertaining to, or coming as from a particular person; individual; private

So, personal is anything that is about oneself. It is about those intimate dealings. It is about the everyday activities we do from making love to the place that we live to where we work to how we shit. The personal is who we are. What, than, is the political?

po·lit·i·cal

[puh-lit-i-kuhl]

adjective

1 : of or relating to government, a government, or the conduct of government

2: of, relating to, or concerned with the making as distinguished from the administration of governmental policy

Thus, the political is that which is public. It is those institutions and systems that govern us and tell us what is normal and what is abnormal. It is about the ideas that tells us that a family is a man and a woman and 2.5 children. The ideas that tell us that white is normal and kinky hair is ugly. The politcal is what in-forms us to what we are.

H0w then are these related? If the personal is about us and the political is about big ideas where is that they meet? How are they the same? I would argue that there sameness stems from the fact that they in-form each other. The political in-forms our views and beliefs and who were are attracted to and what careers we pursue. In turn, our attitudes and experiences (or that which is personal) influences and shifts and in-forms what our politics are. Our experience and attitude in-form what our experiences are. It is a cycle that perpetuates itself.

Moreover, by recognizing that the personal is political and the political is personal we can than identify how they work and how to change them. If social justice is about changing the politic of the world so that  than the first step is claiming our own personal experiences and using them consciously to change the political. Its about sharing our stories and sharing who we are so that we can change the world around us.

So this brings me to the point of this blog. I want this blog to be a sharing of myself to others so that I can help foster social change and social justice. This blog will include stories and poems and different musings. Take what you like and leave the rest but know that when you read this, you are reading a part of me.

PS I’m gonna be putting up some kinky erotica soon so stay tuned!!