Another Day...Another Shooting.

To Whom It May Concern,It isn't for lack of training or neglected protocol that the headlines read the same today as they have everyday for the past week and some change. BLACK MAN GUNNED DOWN BY POLICE. I would be remiss if I kept silent and played the role of compliant fool or docile citizen. The anger and sadness I feel inside boils. My heart aches. Not the metaphorical kind of pain, but a sharp stabbing sensation that makes me clutch my chest and writhe in my bed. I bury my head under the covers and cry silent to tears for the victim's family and my own. Compassion makes me pray for them, yet I feel guilty at the relief I feel knowing it wasn't MY brother of MY father.

Thoughts race crashing into the parapets of my mind. I desperately search for an outlet, a platform. Something that will allow me to voice my discontent and rally THE PEOPLE behind my cause. I want to kneel with Colin Kaepernick. I want to throw my fist in the air reminiscent of John Carlos and Tommie Smith in '68 Olympics Games. I want to riot in the streets like my brother and sisters in Charlotte. But I don't. My words have always been my weapon. My voice has always been my battle trumpet. I will speak of injustice with a sincere and convicted heart. I will shame prejudice behavior and those who condone it.

This blog is about me, every struggle and every success. My current state of mind has been ravaged by the violence against my demographic. After the shooting of Terence Crutcher I turned on my XBOX and logged into my HULU account. I searched for part one of ROOTS, the 2016 remade version. I pressed play...and I cried. I cried for the helplessness I feel. I cried for the familiarity of seeing Black people treated like cattle and property. I cried because though we have been freed by announcement, we are still bound by the chains that kept our ancestors in the fields. I ask myself. What can I do to invoke change?

The answer came to me on the whisper of a simple idea. Do what is in your realm to do. I can speak. Regardless of an audience or a platform I have to speak. I know that bottling up these thoughts and ideas are scarier than just being honest with myself. I refuse to watch the news these days. I already what the headlines read. I disgusted by my exhaustion and sometimes flippant response to the killing of innocent people. When you feel powerless to promote change sometimes it is easier to ignore its necessity. Yet I do what I must to exercise these demons. I write songs I will never perform. I author poems I will never recite. I paint pictures I will never display. This is my therapy. I hope it will assuage the anguish and resentment I feel, being Black in America. Only time will tell. For now I just write. It is what is in my realm to do.

How has the recent highlighting of police brutality in America effected you? What, if any solution, do you think can resolve the current strife between police and the communities they're sworn to protect? Let me know what you think Weirdies!!

DEDICATED TO TERENCE CRUTCHER & KEITH LAMONT SCOTT

#politics #economy #conflict #europe