Dear Mr. Jordan...

Just a video of M.J. DUNKING on Ewing during one of those football like
Bulls vs. Knicks playoff games...



Now then,
I wrote a poem after I saw a commercial around the time of the 2009 NBA Playoffs.
At the time, I thought that his endorsement would seal the deal, but as the video below shows, he didn't go to Coppenhagen with Obama/Oprah/Daley, etc.

So, as it turns out,
maybe he concentrated more on his braggadocio hall of fame speech. Can't blame him.
So here's my poem...
____________________________
Dear. Mr. Jordan

Hi, Like most people who grew up in Chicago,
I grew up watching you,
watching you slow motion
float thru hater-lane defenses
and camera shot flashes.
They would always
attempt to capture you,
but could never keep you on the ground,
you always figured out a way
to fly,
anti Kunta kicking high
into opponents faces,
slammed shame of defeat.

You made this city's shoulders
more broad, proud, arrogant enough
to tear its own heart out,
light it on fire,
then put it back in the next morning without
worry of acid reflux.

You help inspire the law enforcement officers
create a "pen" for its street stampeders,
its horned shit starters,
its true fans.

Because a real fan embodies its team's spirit
not drunkenly hibernating thru seasons
like certain baseball/football teams.

To say the least,
people consider you a Diety around here.

While drinking and playing cards,
a friend says,
"I ain't never seen Jesus,
but I seen Jordan"

Then proceeds to tell a story about being neighbors
with your X-wife,
while you all were courting,
and how you came down the block
like the Mayor of the Southside (because you were)
in a Lamborgini,
cruising of course,
until you saw a basketball hoop
in the middle of the street,
so you proceeded to entertain
a young fan,
with a one on one game,
where he crossed you
and made his shot,

So thusly,
being the winner you are,
you went to the car,
switched shoes,
went back,
and dunked on the kids
ego,
and he said thank you.

We,
in this town,
appreciate being put in our place,
as long
the person putting us there
is our hero.

You saved Chicago from being
second place,
made our Sears Tower seem taller,
we appreciate these things.

So with ALL that being said,
Mr. Hero,
why is it that your attempting
to make it harder to live in this city
for those that are of, from,
birthed by,
poor'd indebt to...
maybe they can't monitarily
support you
like those who
hibernate,
fatten'd off of
this cities exclusive circles
ariola blood suckers
with their front row tickets to
see you fly...

But why are you helping them
use this Olymipics Bid,
2016,
like Louisiana Levees,
2005,
another reason to market flood
rising rent prices like
tieds when scooba gear gets
unaffordable.

I guess the answer is,
displaced refugees aren't really
your fans in the end...

Only the people who help you
pay your gambling debts
and your alimony checks.

Sorry Mr. Jordan,
for wasting your time...

I use to like Pippen more
anyhow...

adendum

Thank you Mr. Jordan,
For not giving a fuck enough to stay out of Copenhagen.

Wild Leek

Wild Leek

Striped Skunk town

piss runnin’ down

Dan Ryan’s leg red,

reaks of 

Public Transit love

smells,

old enchanted valentine’s

hell,

fires and mass-acres

wires and sky scraper

scratchin’ sun’s cornia.

Land of California,

Robert Johnson Rhyme

swelterin’ summertime

deffer’d dreams,

exploding raisins dried like

Sidney Poiter screamin’

about that…

Walter,

send off man,

Florida Evans sayin’
”Damn, Damn, Damn”

Genius Artistic Ghetto Children

Hustle, Flow and Limp through

Hallways of Privately owned

Science Experiments,

who don’t give a shit ‘bout

hoods wit rats,

alley’s wit cats,

street tribes barely survive

spiked wit bats, at best

at worst, scratched serial shots

spillin’ milk for material Mot,

poor out a little sacrifice

for syphilis Capone,

God of Canenites Mosquito Bite,

Drivin’ Cars into homes.

We Leak that Wild shit...

Our governors is cop like crooked,

two in a row,

our Jr. Senators took it,

to a new arena,

to another show,

only Black, look it,

both historical.

That’s that Juan Magic

Pootie Tang Talk,

Herbie Hancock,

superhero drunken

monkeees unknown

Willie Lords of Vice tragic,

Celtic Champs throw up flags

on National TV,

D.A. spit smart static

when walkin’ wit him,

Rasheed’s sense uncommon,

till Hollywood hit him.

My Island been Stony,

like them cluckas been boney.

Clowns terrorize like homey,

you had to be there.

You gon’ mob wit somebody somewhere

when Developmental Growth is arrested

to County Cot

overpopulated punch to the nose 

blood bubble snot.

Even if you could pray to Al- Ka’aba,

you still best to know ya lit.

Violation pumpkin heads have you lookin’ like

Kanye Car Accidents,

oops,

maybe that’s coincidence,

like sellin’ the same beat twice.

This is Nelson Algren’s Hustle Town,

his triangle shaped square is where

pigeons and whineno’s

freeze in peace,

nice,

this is Chicago. 

Shock (4 Grandmaster Flash)

So I did read some poetry yesterday for an art show
the Tres Collective curated @ Hyde Park Art Center,
and the art I had to read my poems with was made by
this dude who I met @ an art show last year, but I had forgot his name
(yeah, I need to calm down the smoke).
In either which case, I got to know his work then be reintroduced to him,
and he was cool about it.

Here are the pieces ["Speakerboy" and "Speakerboy Epiphany" by Dustin Harris]...


This first one went with the "Clapping" poem.

Then next one went with this poem down here...




Shock (4 Grandmaster Flash)

-
Where you ever a kid?

Child of shot Kings and X’s
over generation gaps
like Sewed skin flabes
from landmind-limb loss,
numb noose, plastic
pulling veins from skinny uncles,
big brothers, and fathers.
auction block draftees,
never totally turning re-
minded shock shells un-
mended, music
spinning sanity,
humanizing home
minders re-
turning totally
never really
left that damned dank dark jungle.

-
Telling a child,
“Don’t be fuckin’ with my records’
is like telling sexed crazied addolesent boy
“Don’t be watchin Cinemax after 12:30am”

Hell,
I saw my first naked woman on
the cover of my dad’s Ohio Players album,
after he told me,
“Don’t be fuckin’ with my records”

-
Have you ever been scolded?
Really,
red skin blisters
crackling palms
peeling prickled
electric endings
tendon tension…
Touch a buzz saw,
lick a frozen lamp post, un-
pressured by peering eyes.
What if peering pulp curses were
paternal?

-
Telling a child
to not tinker,
not to transform
things, inanimate,
to not draw life from rocks,
leggos, dirt, clay, breath in the cold,
mysteries in snowballs,
building sand empires…
How many future doctors are told
to not dissect a frog?
Telling a future engineer
to throw away their Kinnex set…
Telling a future business CEO
to light his monopoly set on fire is nothing
in comparison to
taking your child’s hands,
placing their palms on a boil pointed
radiator,
because those hands are attempting to learn
livelihood,
tinker with things that will help turn,
evolve, grow the lives of everyone around him...
that is fucking shameful.


{oh and don't forget to download the mixtape...}

Clapping (4 Michael)

first off, I know that most people on earth have been effected either negatively or
positively by this man.

I wrote this to express my subjective opinion on how I feel about his untimely death.


There is a Roger Bonair-Agard quote that inspired me to start this that goes
"His blood is on all our hands" (about Michael Jackson)...





Clapping (4 Michael) by IL. Subliminal



1)
When two hands clasp, embrace,
the friction secretes energy,
Ki’s of heat opening potential
we might have historically harnessed
in ancient sands of
Imhotep mastery,
but now we,
people Black camped
concentrate on consumption,
constipating in reverse.
We hardly know no trade.
We hardly trade no barter.
We mostly wait on couches,
potato baked,
suckling a tubes glass gland,
milking maternal materialism.

2)
Michael was an angel,
with Genitalia,
that he pulled, a lot,
while performing.
Possessed by the spotlight.
Stripping revolutionary,
rotate walking on satellites police only waxed
wanting weeded transmutation
they will never wave-
winged like he
held households,
waning.

3)
Energy never disappears,
never dissipates,
only diverts direction,
even inadvertedly inverse.
Vacuums,
holed hurricanes,
tornado eyes all excrete
extreme implosive circumstance
because of
negatively enforced inertia.

4)
Michael was an angel,
with clipped wings.
The only blues man to ever have his soul
cross-roaded
without his say so.
There is always a reason,
a carrot string,
pulling toward the third railroading
6 train
tracking the ultimate con.
What if the confidence was placed
by
a child’s love,
a child’s need for acceptance,
belonging,
to a family heroine syringe roped to the sound of
audience appreciation?


5)
“Childhood has become the great casualty of modern living,
all around us we are producing scores of kids,
who have not had the joy,
who have not been afforded the right,
who have not been allowed the freedom
of knowing what its like to be a kid.”

In 2001,
Michael Jackson said this to a very quiet
and attentive Oxford audience
after which of course,
they clapped.



{THIS IS THE SPEECH WHERE HE SAID THIS}










this is how I want to remember Mr. Jackson.

Be peaceful (I hope you watched these and listened).