Poem of the Week – But The Heart Said No

They saw the poor living in cardboard shacks, so they knocked the shacks down and built projects. Huge blocks of cement and glass towered over asphalt parking lots. Somehow it wasn’t much like home, even home in a shack. “What do you expect?” they asked impatiently. “You’re too poor to live like us. Until you can do better for yourselves, you should be grateful, shouldn’t you?”

The head said yes, but the heart said no.

Poem of the Week – A Letter to the Law

Dem boy wanna talk like dem wanna gon come
But what you gon’ do if you got one gun?
I sing a song for the hero unsung
With faces on the mural of the revolution
No looking back, cause in back is what’s done
Tell the preacher God got more than one son
Tell the law my Uzi weighs a ton

Imperium:Understanding the Insidious

Historically, few things have been more frightening than violent extremism. It has been the muse behind some of the most heinous acts of savagery in human history. War, genocide, slavery, terrorism, and nearly every barbarous deed imaginable will find its roots in extremism of one stripe or another. The reactions to bellicose extremism have been as diverse as its manifestations. In some cases extremism was met in kind with an equally combative opposing ideology, in others, with assertive pacifism and systemic pressure. Regardless of the reactions to it, extremist ideology engenders the worst in human kind by manipulating its best qualities and deepest fears.

What Everyone is Missing About Luke Cage…

 

There has been a lot of fanfare recently surrounding Luke Cage, the most recent collaborative offering to the small screen from Netflix and Marvel. For the uninitiated, Luke Cage is a comic book character first released in 1972’s Marvel comic Hero for Hire #1. In the comics his superhero powers were fairly standard: he was inhumanly strong and impervious to bullets. He began his superhero career as a hired hand, helping anyone that could pay his fee. His character, clad in a yellow blouse and blue bell-bottom jeans was one of the few black superheroes featured in comic books when it was released. Luke Cage’s character has always been complex. His origin story began with a life of crime, and even after he was released from prison, he continued to walk that fine line until he developed closer relationships with other superheroes and grew to his full potential.  His character arc in the comics was a story of redemption. He began his tale nearly dead from a mafia beating, and we watch him progress as he becomes not only a respected superhero, but a leader as well.

Poem of the Week – Poem of Victory

I came, and thou smotest the princes of Zahi.
I scatter them under thy feet over all their lands.
I make them behold thy Holiness like the beaming (sun).
Thou shinest in sight of them in my form.
I came, and thou smotest those who dwell in Asia,
Thou madest prisoners the goatherds of Ruthen.