Split this Rock is an organization that posts a poem every week–they advertise as “poems of provocation and witness.” This one really caught my attention:
Still Life with Bullets
Orlando Jones, a black actor, douses himself
in a bucket of bullets. I flinch. Bullet against
brown skin even without the bruised and
busted aftermath is no easy thing to bear. Even
at the distance of Facebook. There is nothing beautiful
about the gilt curves of each bullet, nothing admirable
about the bullet’s svelte ferocity, no safety knowing
these bullets are holding their tempers. Afterwards
the spent bullets lie on pavements, hide in bodies satisfied
that they have perfectly executed what they are
built to do. How many of us brown people can say that?
That we have utterly spent ourselves on the purpose that
made us who we are? How many of us never become
much of anything but skin stuffed with rage and grief?