ON THEIR BIRTHDAY, SUGE KNIGHT & MY DADDY DISCUSS FORGIVENESS
BY TARIQ THOMPSON
Recipient of the 2020 Adroit Prize for Poetry
Selected by Jericho Brown
For years crime & cry seemed like the same word.
You can be & do crime. I suppose you can be a cry,
Too. a warning. wailing, I think, should be seen
As a signal to the self. there is a whale in the ocean
Everyone calls lonely. its cries, like a child, are heard
By no one. it’s talking to itself. ignoring the fact that
It is a whale, ignoring the fact that it lurks, I see myself.
It is real gangsta to be alone. this way, you answer
To no one. my baby boy came into this world
Screaming. rocking him in my arms, I named him
The morning sun. I caved & loved him. I left.
One evening, puffing weed crumbles into my chest,
I remembered the dawn. the light, greeting the clouds,
Greeting the moon. yet, every night, leaving.
ON OUR BIRTHDAY, MALCOLM X & I DISCUSS THE MEANS
BY TARIQ THOMPSON
Any so called Negro or Nigga or Black Hope,
To remain alive, must first figure his place
Amongst his people, meaning those steeped
In steeples, the stalwarts, the mean-mannered
Individuals. they named me blood, kin, brother,
Son. in the southern heat they asked me to eat
The flesh of another man & called this the means.
They told me to drown myself & called this necessary.
Before God there was some kind of dark & after,
Some kind of distance. the claustrophobia in the word rhythm
Compelled me to kneel. before what, I’m unsure, but I am
From Memphis. in the southern deep I felt the buzzing of blues
Baritones. I learned a long time ago that you were murdered
In a ballroom, & I can picture you waltzing on a grave.
