Juneteenth (Sweet Tooth)
Red is for the blood we shed
on the battlefields
in the cotton and tobacco fields
in the quarters
on the Jim Crow streets
swinging from the limbs of pines, oaks, and maples
a strange fruit
stolen people
in a stolen land
traded from hand to hand
human cattle
of the American chattel
system
rightfully named slavery
not something flowery
or with mystique
like a “peculiar institution”
slavery
human bondage
worked from sunup to sundown
beaten, brutalized, raped, maimed, tortured, killed
dehumanized
so four hundred years later
on June nineteenth
we eat red
strawberry soda
watermelon
red velvet cake
sugary
sweet
diabetic
ridiculed
but what’s new
does it matter what we do
let’s celebrate, rejoice, educate
but let us also
eat the red
for the blood
that was shed
sticky and thick
like syrup
covering this new land
consider leaving a coffee tip here :-) ☕️✨
cash app for eggs🥚 — $rosmorr
You keep on doing excellent work. Thank you.