What is it going to take to make a difference in a world
defined by walls? Some people can only experience True Freedom within the
confines of the walls they call home.
Comfort. Safety. Peace. Right?
In a perfect world, walls could solve the disgrace that
overwhelms the space of an educational system that serves as a training ground
for the walls of incarceration.
I don’t get the hesitation in paying a suitable salary for a
teacher’s vocation, when it is common knowledge that they are grooming the
minds of our future.
What is this fascination with walls?
The walls I see, the corridors that I frequent are
structured for the purpose of promoting penitence for the eyes outside; A
distorted view of the gloom, where the faces of executed men makeup the
metaphorical wallpaper that tends to obstruct the scenery for me.
To a human soul that is subject to the corruption of the
warehouse rhetoric that turns men into drones:
Count Time! Outside Rec! All available staff! Lock down!
Yeah, this may be a house of some sort, but it damn sure
ain’t no home of mine.
This is a House where the residents file grievances to their
captors with the intent to subdue their comrade’s will to live. What is this place?!
This is a place where fortified walls are not the greatest
obstruction. This House of Disruption annihilates brain cells, and then
replaces them with artificial thoughts that precipitate the horrendous actions
of one-upsmanship.
Wall-to-wall hate, at a time when all of us are enemies of
the state.
I swear when I look through the plexiglass and steel I can’t
help but feel, like bad breath; my lawyers won’t stand still long enough to
give me a straight answer. It seems they
have no interest in what I have to say unless it confirms what they think they
know.
And the leader of the FREE World has requested 5.7 billion
to build a border wall? It is clear the borders are already in place.
And here I am, chasing my ancestry with the hopes and
aspirations of discovering more than a nigga.
It’s no wonder I feel like Drew Brees when I’m on my knees begging the
ultimate official to throw the flag on this grave interference.
The last thing we need are more walls. These walls will discharge the instinct to
stand tall.
Ironically enough our country’s freedom song encourages
citizens to stand erect as a show of respect, while the rhythm spews the views
of America’s worst in the Star Spangled’s omitted third verse:
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight
Or the gloom of the grave:
And the Star-Spangled banner in triumph Doth wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave
The red, white and blue, but the shade of red in that
jumpsuit that covers you is simply another wall with pockets, stitches, and all
of the connotation of separation by death.
Still Livin,’
Copyright © 2019 by Leroy Elwood Mann