WHY DO THEY CALL BILL CLINTON THE FIRST BLACK PRESIDENT?
Perhaps its
Baptist Donkey rides
Mom trailer trips
to McDonalds
Arkansas tire swings
Ya’ll come back now
and smothered biscuits
cant keep it in his pants
wink and a finger gun
Mr. Blue Suit
Dangling cigar ethos
chomped dead by
wise crackers
The degenerate
Half brother showing up
hat in hand
saxophone cheeks
Arsenio Hall’s high pitch giggle
Maya Angelou inaugurates
Toni Morrison seals the deal
Shady-gate black shadow
real estate shenanigans
The don’t ask don’t tell
Matter-of-fact don’t ask
Slick Willie stuff
Perhaps they mean black
like burning sand
smokestack
scud missile
bleak
NAFTA NATO
Outsourced
downsized
Nike made silicon chips
Superhighway
Yugo Bosnian
Somalia Operation
Desert Fox
Kick in the door
flag in the dirt
Pirate’s patch black
Ak-47 black
007’s bow tie black
black like the absence of color
black. maybe
that’s what they mean
—from Rattle #31, Summer 2009
Tribute to African American Poets
__________
Idris Goodwin: “I come from a long line of hard working, hard playing, quick witted Midwest African Americans that taught me the correlation between work and dream. I write poems because there are few things more satisfying.” (web)
