"Free Your Mind and Your Ass Will Follow" P. Funk

Are we just all slaves to society?
Lack of variety
What do the conspiracy theorist say?
Do you live in a red or blue state?
I live in a New York State of mind just like Nas
Caught up in the Wizard of Oz
Oh where oh where can that black messiah be I think he got shot by NYPD
Stop and Frisk walk at your own risk
Where is the justice for Eric Gardner he can't breathe I can't breathe we can't breathe or believe the brutality against humanity
The only ones breathing are the one percent they sleep fine as they collect our fines
Caught in a bind going blind on the the chopping line
Blind sided by the bankers bullied by Wall Street what a feat the taste of defeat
I sit and watch my bank account plummet from a small summit
We shall overcome, overcome it
What's the plan to move ahead before we reach the day of the dead
Break the seal go ahead and steal the government steals from me
This year I will pay $9000 in taxes way too much for the middle classes
Goddamn Uncle Sam I wish I could slam go blam blam boom
Tax the rich yes tax them they are the ones who can pay but don't pay they get away
Look at Bernie Madoff  he made off with billions
How can that be? Ponzi scheme was his theme living the dream
Yeah but now he's someone's bitch getting anally raped ponzi that
Big time hustle that's all companies are a big time hustle
They do what the little guy does on the street but that don't get arrested they get kick backs
Those are the facts while the little guy sells corner crack and heroine smack
Gets the jail shack shackles, shackles shuffle
All those criminals in a line three strikes in some states adds up to a life time
Imagine that a life time behind those dirty violent walls
Getting old and dieing getting sick slowly deteriorating and waiting for a sentence that Never ends till your funeral probably buried your body in the back yard
Enclosed fences never free when the state owns your body
But what about the mind when it is confined over time
Does it slip lose grip solitary confinement makes many flip
Get hip to this we are the only country to enforce solitary confinement it's so inhuman
America has the biggest prison population in all of creation

What does that tell you?
Control it's all about control and who is and who is not on the dole or payroll

Forgotten Memories

Daily the deluge of doses keeps me hovering on low
I move slow I forget time and time forgets me
Where was I formed I wonder
The religious folks believe God made me but then who made God
What was before the Big Bang nothingness
Cold blackness an eternal vacuum of gloom
Oh if I could go back to the start of this crazy ass faction
I would pledge my soul for good
So many mean people in the world and they all suck
Love is hard to find to be kind
I wish to link together the chain of infinity
Bring back my heart from the brink of destruction
I wish to taste the wind
Climb the highest mountain K2
Stand on the summit and embrace the top of the world
Tranquility I seek thee rest on my naked body
Spring through my veins
My blood is boiling with disaster
Decrepit and retched I wish to escape the stink of my groin
The water it hurts me burns my skin
A sudden sting to ring it's a big thing
Let me ride that north shore wave to the border line of insanity
Take me in your mist you running Rapids
Hold me in your deepest of swells
Ride me to the desert sand hold my hand
On this bipolar roller coaster
Up up up and away
Down down down I feel my stomach sink my head is thrown back
I can't relax I need that avenue I can't find myself
A wander Jew a lost gypsy a timeless hippie
Oh if I could fling myself to the stars and soar on a Falcons wings
I want that birds eye view of the city skyline
Perch on the Freedom Tower dangle from the Empire State Building
Swing like Tarzan over quicksand
You will find me in your fantasy in that erased dream
Fast forward this world has no rewind
Take a selfie of your soul next time

Wayword Spiral

Digging in the trenches of my mind thoughts are like land mines
enter the deepest depth of a crazy solitude in the worst mood
happiness fails to find me even though I googled it many times
sadness lingers like a unwanted mole a thick scab has formed on my heart
looking for the turn off exit sign I'm stuck on the 95 from here to Florida
traffic is running bumper to bumper rubber necking
whom can I turn  to flee my sorrow staring at an avalanche of tomorrow's
everyday another dose of pills fills my body my brain turns numb
I dance in the deluge of my depression and wait to embrace the sweet tears
115 years old is the oldest person in the world what a torture chamber of misery that would be for me
I just try to hold on to survive the day
night time comes and some how I mange to peer my head up over the covers
yes my bed is my escape wishing to dream till I die
I dream of my mother with her face swiveling in my head
maybe I wish to join her for she has long since passed
her ashes sit in my apartment but yet her spirit consumes me
where might she be on this cold January night out of sight
if only I could shake this onslaught of madness
to be awakened from my nightmare released from the mess inside my skull
god dammit boy pull yourself up from your boot straps you may say
some may think it's not that bad but oh if you could spend the day inside my mind
you could see the darkness sink down the walls of my soul
slip down the throat of my heart and taste the bitterness of the moment
it gets harder to rise then it was yesterday it gets more difficult to decipher the condition of my mental
this journey that I have embarked on seems to have no jump off point no start no beginning
oh I know I started somewhere somehow with a sperm and an egg
but somewhere it all went south down hill with no brakes falling from 30,000 feet with no parachute
   

The Presence of Absence

Weather the warm storm of a heart flood mixed in mud blood
Blending the fore front of time
Howling in a dirty wind
Soaking in a nasty breeze
Peep show striptease
Everybody wants their lion share
Get your billions back America
Taxing the souls of taxpayers
Criminal minds say pay me in cash
Quick dash fuck you pay me
The invisible mantra of mayhem maybe the end
Stacks of old money run blue in the veins
Pull in the reins on the African jungle rain
Don't kill the beast of Crowley unleash the 666
Caught in the Devils mix does not exist
Too many waiting for that white Cadillac ride to the other side
Some wait for heaven others for Dantes inferno
Sporting a pitchfork and a halo
While I dream of the dead on a Cinco De Mayo Mexican Saturday night
My bones are dry my eyes won't cry
Silence slips through my finger tips
Somewhere along the line they clipped my angel wings
Buzz cut my spirit and tamed my crazy horse
I run off course in the land of the lost
Riding bare back in a Hopi sun
I wish to burn brightest on my long down fall
Into to next season intoxicated on words
Drunk off lust and high on crime
I sail into the black hole of the abyss with my eyes wide shut

Sweetly bitter

No end to the race no end to the chase caught again in the back of my mind playing with c4 hit the floor I got the sweetest moonshine from Alaska to baton rouge sure to make you body shake sometimes I wonder what will kill me make me die transpire show me the body of evidence maybe an accident or some lay wasting disease will get me makes me wonder when my time is going to be up no I wouldn't mine not waking up again being dead escaping my head for sure to vanish into the mist disappear like bang the Big Bang the big easy the big dead head how many more days on this long road of sorrows

Where To Fit In

Don't think heaven is free
You must pay a renter’s fee
Space is hard to find cuz people stay a very long time
You want a room here?
We got 40 billion people living in a studio
Look out the window you can see hell on the horizon
God is our landlord
He never gives heat cuz heaven is cold
He says you must pay me in gold if you want to save your soul if
You’ll be sent to hell if you can't afford the rent

There are nice co ops but they’re filled with spirits rising from cemetery plots
Angels sit on the co op board and complain how recent tenants have spilled sin all over the new wall to wall carpets
Space as at a premium but we have nice time share locations
All the rich live in the projects on the south side
The poor live in beach condos
People are always moving in and bitching about why no animals are allowed in the apartments
Yes heaven is not free
What were you thinking getting a two year lease that never ever expires
And yes after 30 days you can still be evicted if you break one of the ten rules of conduct
Management reserves the right to evict any resident
Don't fall behind in your rent because every day their are  a million new tenants
Yes heaven is over crowed
The price is very high it's the only place everyone wants to go but is afraid of the expensive long hearse death ride
Hell is free everybody is accepted no discrimination.

The devil slumlord turns up the heat in the summer
There is no running water
No lights
Fights every nights
Constant break ins
No rules or regulations
The staircases are never clean
Paint peeling walls filled with lead poison
Billions of squatters live in burned out buildings
The angels are all full time arsonists
Everyday a new building is set on fire
Everybody complains
Satan says what do you expect when everything is free
5 trillion homeless sleep on the streets
Yes hell is overcrowded and all the doors are locked
It's one big prison
A list of all your sins is display proudly in full color tattoos
The inmates run the asylum
Yes Satan is the warden everyday burned rice and beans are served
There are no correction officers, no cops
Every other second another prisoner is shanked
Hell is dark and stank
The criminally insane sit on the co op board and only the worst of the worst get to live in best apartments in the basement
Yes hell is overcrowded

MyLife Is Hungry

Dying of thirst

lost in a wild fire

burned by blow back

stomach growling

fingers twitching

trying to reach and grasp the wind

my life is oozing slowly like wounds that won’t heal

blood drips from my soul as everything folds

I hear the drunk Hispanic man on 168 Street and Broadway yelling out mi vida, mi vida, mi vida, tengo hambre,

hungry for what I can’t have

hungry for what my hands fail to hold

thirsty for my brain lost in my psychosis

not rooted in reality

my life’s in a tail spin

a free for all fall 

parched in the driest desert

waking in pools of fear

on the precipice of disaster

trying to run faster

I can’t catch my breath

running from death

my life is starving

shriveled up and anorexic

depressed and dejected

spiraling down like a slinky on the steps of Machu Picchu  

no food can feed me

liquid fails to satisfy my cotton mouth

I’m lost on the summit in a moment I will plummet

my life is falling apart like a Volkswagen with 400,000 miles on it

The inside is dying

waiting to die

my spirit is frying

my life is hungry 

Venting Again

I want to vent about the crack heads in the ghetto

The meth mouths in the middle and south

I want to vent about fracking dirty water and worldwide genocides

The new world order the free masons and

Fi Bata Capa’s sorority and frat house hazing

The on coming apocalypses cops’ glock clips and slave master whips

The holocaust and all that was lost

Harvard and Yale graduates on welfare lines

a sign of desperate times

I want to vent like the 99 percent about the mistreatment

Climate change and global warming and the on coming ice age that is forming

Disfigured and deformed lab animals.

The treatment of cattle M16 gun rattle in a senseless battle

I want to vent about the poor and indigent dying by the millions of aids

because of drug companies making money on pharmaceutical cures while Magic Johnson analyzes NBA games with his HIV looking in perfect health

I want to vent about the abundance of wealth kept to self

And covert missions marked as stealth

Private wars by black water and black ops

The hijacking of the Internet the censorship fighting in the Middle East

and embargo in the Gaza strip

I want to vent about the high drop out rate of truant high school students

and unemployment numbers zooming up like a thermometer in the Sahara desert

Children in third world countries living in shantytown shacks and sleeping on dirt

Acid rain pollution and nuclear waste

first amendment rights and the constitution defaced

I want to vent about child porn and the sex trade

children loosing limbs and legs to land minds and grenades

Republican’s threaten to cut Social Security while

spending trillions on homeland Security

I want to vent about sending people to outer space while whole families are displaced and the ongoing arms race

The United States government smuggling and selling cocaine

paying $12 a pack for Marlboro cigarettes while doing under handed deals ‘

in back alleys to cop a dime bag of weed

Legalize that shit already

I want to vent about pregnant moms on heroin

Like Neil Young said “I’ve seen the needle and the damage done.”

I want to vent and let it all hang out like an ass-naked 352 woman

strolling down Wall Street

More to say then I can write more to write then I can say

Lost In The Tech Age

I forgot my password

Can’t seem to remember it

I did not forget the whole thing

Oh no I did

What was my username?

What? I forgot that too

Damn

Now I can’t work on my website

Got to call the tech guy

Now he asked what is my customer id

I said excuse me what’s that

I spend time entering possible combinations

I know one of them has to work, has to

I try different letters and numbers

My frustration grows as I keep getting that same wrong password window

The browser mocks me YOU FORGOT YOUR PASSWORD

So many numbers and passwords form debit card, locker, bank number, depart of Ed employee number social security, checking account myspace, gmail, hotmail, facebook, twitter 

It’s all too much to keep in my head

My computer remembers all my log in information

But from time to time some how the info gets lost on my hard drive

What is my secret question?

What’s the answer to my secret question?

Which email account did I use to register for this site

I want to see my home page

Should have wrote down the stuff on a sticky note

Or put it in a word file

I smack myself in the forehead

I curse myself

I forgot my password to my email

How can I check my email to get the new temporary password?

My nightmare continues

Did I use upper or lower case letters?

Did I use symbols and numbers?

I start to pull out my hair

Wrong password

Wrong username

Wrong password

Wrong username

It’s highlighted in red

I watch the page reload and hope this time it will work

my faulty memory

I think maybe I should just say fuck it and start a new account

But what about all my emails all my friends and followers

I image tons of important emails coming in that I can’t check

People leaving incredible comments on my facebook page

Having one hundred new followers on twitter

Having hundreds of hits on my flickr photos

I take a deep breath and sigh

I watch the little dots appear on the screen in the password box

I cross my fingers and toes

I try and try like some hacker trying to break a code

I want to explode

Finally I remember the email account I used

I check the email

Get my username and new temporary password

Go back to the website

Type everything in again

It’s a miracle I can see all my shit

I create a new password but again I don’t write it down

Set to repeat the same thing over again

Mic check Mic check

We are back again I represent the 99 percent

Who resents the one percent who has all the money that is spent

They got millions and billons to satisfy the greedy

They don’t care to feed the needy

We camp out and protest the mess
of this so-called democratic process

We march and demonstrate to try to alter our fate

Plastic bullets are fired and still we remain inspired

Tear gas is thrown in the crowd

panic sweeps through like a jet stream in the fogginess

We wonder where is the freedom where is the justice

What crime did we commit?

No one is read their rights. It’s not explained why they’re detained

Americans young old from all backgrounds and colors
dragged with plastic handcuffs on their wrists

Thousands arrested when we protest and resist

Someone’s forgotten my first amendment rights

Someone’s forgotten my right to free assembly

Someone has forgotten this is a democracy

The 99% reach out and rise from a flicker on Wall Street
to a flame burning through our countries main streets to
around the world north south west and east

Hear the sound of marching feet to defeat the elite

We protest against the bankers’ bailouts

We protest against foreclosed homes

Our outrageous student loans

Against our working homeless

We stand against big money in politics

We demand healthcare for the poor who are sick

We amass to stand against corporate greed

We chant for freedom from poverty for those in need

The police come in the dead of night and rip
down our protest signs

They rip down tents and tarps

They trash thousands of library books

They herd us with horses to force us to change
our marching courses

spray us with mace,

fence us in with blockades

The right wing money controlled media turns a blind eye

What is their reply?

Will you sit idly by?

What is the future for our children in this economy?

This country is full of irony

We condemn other countries for limiting freedom of speech

but can’t see our own hypocrisy

Corporations are not people

We need a country that is equal

So mic check this nation

Let the unions take to the streets

Demonstrate a strike

Let us close down ports in Oakland California New York and Florida

Demonstrate in the streets of D.C.

Occupy Wall Street close down the stock exchange

We are the 99 percent screaming it’s time for a change.

     

I have more to say then I can write

I have more to say then I can write


More to write then I can say
More to do then can be done
More to remember then I can forget
Pursuits and quests take me on a mental voyage wresting through intellectual seas
I envision a better me in the future
In Seconds there’s a vast improvement to my empathy
As humanity’s cries are crushed under the weight of one trillion dollars they holler
Couldn’t you have spared a few dollars so my baby has clean water to drink?
Can’t you spare a few euros so for some clean clothes?
Nobody knows the depth of a man’s despair when he’s entrapped in enslavement
Mentally, physically, spiritually,
As is done to us daily because we’re the 99 percent
Two black holes colliding is the gripping emotion of a man before a vile action is taken
Changing his destiny like a shifting of the axis on the intergalactic seascape
How can he recapture his yesterdays
his purity
his innocence?
Now most of us are penniless
His fortune fueled by his missteps
We walk this planet with unhealed bleeding wounds on our souls
And I keep trying to imagine a healing of the injury a complete recovery
To return to a whole state of being
Not only for me but for this great nation
We are made in unique perfection selected for prominence
No matter your name
No matter your color
No matter your country
We are made for brilliance,
To see our destiny and shine
I have more to say then I can write

The Sanctity of Marriage

-->

He watches the playboy channel and masturbates in front of his wife

she thinks he’s lost his mind

to be doing this in front of her after all this time

She just sucked his dick for the first time

but could not bring herself to swallow the sperm

she was concerned

Now she wonders if he’s cheating and it’s not just his dick he’s beating

She sees porn girls on his FaceBook account

there was an intervention with his mother in-law and wife

he cried and said he didn’t know his intentions

did he have to mention a proposition from a women about a sexual position?

how could he stray with four kids and claims he wants another baby by the way

he jerks his wifes head down and pushes it towards his cock

she tells him to stop

and puts him on a sex diet

he is starving to hit it

the drama unfolds as his teenage son puts his two cents in the dispute

on Twitter he follows girls who are cute

maybe he really want a prostitute

he wants his woman to be bitch hoe and mother to his kids

she doesn’t know what to make of his change of attitude

treats her ike some slut he wishes to poke

she said he’s kind of crude

he went to therapy

to cure him of what he couldn’t see

and after one session he said now I see the problem is you not me

now he looks at her with hate

she looks at him and cries

he complains his early twenties wild oats times was deprived

now he’s staying with his sister

hopefully the marriage won’t end up in an infidelity smoke

America's Apology

Congress was in session

to apologize for 400 years of oppression

in succession

America are you really sorry for the slave ships

for the bull whips

for the lynching and raping

for killing of slaves who were escaping

it’s a hole in your history that's still gaping

the selling and buying

of humanity

couldn't you see this was insanity

looting nations for their population

did this bring some consternation

where is the give back for lifetimes of free labor and breaking of backs

to the billions of dollars made off of crops and cotton stacks

America look over the facts

this land is a ceiling and floor filled with bleeding cracks

Is your apology done down on bended knee

You try to forget the atrocity with little civility

A monetary apology for those descendents of slavery

Would be a better way to say sorry

For the mass graves of African slaves

The separation of families

America this is your history

Like an open wound no way to shut it

murders, raping and maiming

I'm sorry just doesn’t cut it

I'm not down yet

Bring it
I sing it
Just gonna fling it
Go off the top and wing it
I got to do my best
So put me to the test
Let the troubles come son
And watch me overcome every one
This life is a constant fight
In the thick of the fight of my life
It’s life or death so i got to be set
it’s my survival instinct
I stay on the brink trying not to sink
So bring it
Yet another day
Another trouble
For the dubble-X
What’s next got to be ready for what ever
Death haunts me, wants to sever my connections
But I’m gonna survive this hurricane weather
Whatever it takes
I try not to break
So bring it
I can curve and move straight
Through the hard times
The tough binds
I won’t resign
On the edge of crossing the last line
Dancing on my last nerve
Tinkering on the edge caught in a wedge
So bring it
Another bad job
Another rowdy kid mob
I motivate watch me create
I got what it takes since I busted out the gate
So bring it watch me sting it
I’m cooked but not done
I get stunned
Get knocked to the mat
then I snap right back

Ground Zero

A ground of heroes
Trying to save those who could not evade the day
A day that will never fade
Many buried under a trouble of rubble
Graves, unmarked graves
Bodies broken and torn beyond recognition
An unthinkable strike came to fruition
The devastation of man made creation
The situation seems bleak has havoc was wreaked
The Twin Towers was a symbol of power
Took years to build knocked down in less than an hour
These buildings etched our skyline
Most took for granted they’d stand the test of time
Workers inside typing, trading, clicking, mailing, faxing, emailing, talking, telephoning, walking, waiting, goofing off, debating, thinking of tonight, that they’d make love tonight or overcome a marital fight
In an instant their lives were gone, gone, gone
Thrown into terror this should’ve been an error
It’s a nightmare instead
This fear
This smoke
Did commercial planes fly into the World Trade Center?
My mind can’t get around it
can’t understand it.
The smoke rises out of the copy room window
Thick black smoke
Smoke to choke
Smoke to kill
A smoke of death
I stare into the distance expecting to see The Towers materialize before my eyes
The words fall out of peoples mouths and rest on my ears
Did you hear! The World Trade Centers fell! They’re gone!
Trying to process
to compute, how many people worked in those buildings, how many kids will not have a mother, a father, a bother, a sister, a boyfriend a girlfriend, a close friend, an enemy, a loved one a spouse
MISSING is the word that is flashed across the TV screen
M I S S I N G
So many missing
Missing in action,
Lost, disappeared into a cloud of dust - just like that - missing
How they’re missing them
Missing them
Hoping wishing
Praying looking
Countless sleepless nights.
“What floor were they on? It’s a phrase
What floor?
How high?
In our minds we imagine
We do the math
How fast could they get down to get out
Breakdowns shout.
The trauma of the tragedy is woven deep in my mind
The trauma of the traumatized as a nation needs therapy
I saw planes crash into buildings people burned alive
We have witnesses to see thousands die.
80 stories high people jump to their deaths
In my dreams I see it again and again

Love is a dangerous disease

Love seizes you unexpectedly
changes you makes you act crazy
Many are quickly overcome with matters of the heart
Love lingers and drifts in your vicinity
Love hovers suddenly like a helicopter
It makes no sense and at last love is blind
Love finds us as we try to hide and avoid the collide
Once we get a taste of love its flavor lingers in our mouth
its hormones stay in our nostrils
love hangs and dangles from our lips
as hands trace naked bodies with thrusting hip
Love overwhelms and drowns its victims in a sea of emotions
Love never dies and in many cases is a terminal condition so
don't run to your physician cause he can only listen
no drugs or prescriptions can be given to make it subside
Big love is riding high waiting for your reply
some try to resist but it's hopeless
I must confess taking the Love fall strikes us all
Falling in love could make you lose your grip and slip
It's simple and at the same time complex
Sometimes it adds stress
Sometimes love breaks up or ends is success
Some fall in love over and over again and again
like there is no end the two try to blend to one
at times love comes undone like loosely
tied shoes or knots the love just stops
Does love grow cold when it gets old
When too much strife breaks up husband and wife
At times some love lasts for life
Other times loves takes hikes not to return
too bad the burn
Love should come easily
should be free as can be

Spoken Word Post

We recently discovered our Gcast was dead so we are putting this up for the meantime until we figure something else out.

• I sing the Blues For You Todayhttp://www.myspace.com/violetdubblexmusic/music/songs/i-sing-the-blues-for-you-today-80851303
• So A Black Man Is Presidenthttp://www.myspace.com/violetdubblexmusic/music/songs/so-a-black-man-is-president-80851302
• Give Peace A Chance
• Be Bophttp://www.myspace.com/violetdubblexmusic/music/songs/be-bop-80851304
• Moneyhttp://www.myspace.com/violetdubblexmusic/music/songs/gimmee-money-80851305

Violet & Dubblex on iLike - Get updates inside iTunes

Graffiti Bust

My day begins with two tabs of Klonopin
Trying to make my anxiety run thin
Today is my day at court
No way to abort
My hands tingle and I run to bathroom twice
My bowels loosen as fear runs through my intestines
Inside of me is a question
I keep on guess’en
What will be the fine
Will I have to face a judge and cop prison time
No way to rewind
Stuck in a bind
I pay my $2.25
For a train ride
Head down to Franklin Street
In the city summer heat
I committed a graffiti crime I was outa line
Busted by undercovers in an unmarked gypsy cab
Things went bad
Arrested on a loisada street corner I could not get escape
Cops surrounded me like a round up
They took my bag and stickers and asked, “What’s your tag? Dupplex?” they pronounced it
I declined to correct DubbleX
hands cuffed tightly behind my back
they took my wallet ID and sticker pack
I told them I was mentally ill
My leg started shaking they told me to chill
They asked me if I wanted to go to the hospital
I silently shook my head no
I had trouble getting into the back of the squad car
When the door was ajar
The portly Hispanic officer with a police badge around her neck told me sit down but first
I feared the worst
I did not want to go to prison
For my graffiti sin
But it was either go to the station in the blue and white car
or they offered the loony bin
I finally got in
I sat in the back begged them not to lock me up
I was nowhere near tough enuf when it comes to this stuff
The officer said you’ll get a ticket and go in front of a judge
My background will have a graffitied smudge
The round butch looking Latina officer led me inside the station
I could not believe my situation
She said maybe you’ll get off with a ticket
And we’ll 86 it
Then they found six prescriptions in my bag
The names of the medicines they could not pronounce
One officer flipped through the scripts and shook his head
I said maybe they will let me bounce
The Hispanic officer said you have to wait in the cell
Until the paper work was done then they’d bid me farewell
They took my belt and shoes
I sat there in my socks
Back and forth I rocked
Still in shock now I was locked
They gave me a pink ticket and released me
I was so happy to be prison free I could not see
Today is the court day I must face
A long line of people only one from the white race
All hoping to beat their case
Minorities like me
All copping a plea
One guy said he got a ticket for playing basketball in the park at nighttime
The sign said the park closed at dusk so the police made the bust
We passed the security checkpoint
They searched everything
Looking for a weapon I did not bring
I got upstairs a long line snaked through a large room
A guy behind me said plead not guilty
Another guy with dreads falling out of his head said
Back in the day he use to get up
Said graffiti is like a drug addiction
I need to grow up and get in remission
Finally I reached the window counter
I gave the woman I encountered my pink ticket which I had almost lost before when I switched to my new Ed Hardy bag
To my relief she said my case had been dismissed
The police failed to file their complaints, guess they didn’t care about this
I smiled and went on my way to do more graffiti the very next day

Ethnic Domicile

Summer in Washington Heights
Dominicans open fire hydrants
releasing water at full pressure
The gutter is quickly turned into a river
People forced to hop over curbs to keep sandaled feet from getting wet
The water spews out like a jet
Kids dripping with sweat
Adults work a wrench to open the tightly twisted hydrant cap
Old coffee cans are held over hydrant as water shoots up high into the sun filled sky
Young kids get drenched
Garbage on the sidewalk leaves an unpleasant scent
Hamburger Meat gets grilled on street corners
Thousands sit on beach and lawn furniture in the street
In front of what used to be an old horse stable
Is now an electrical station
In front of dilapidated buildings
In front of ghetto shadows
Surrounded by lamppost light sitting in huddles
Lazily laying on bed comforters and sheets
Young mothers and children jam the stoop steps in front of the building forcing me to squeeze by
Kids draw with kaleidoscope of colorful chalk on the sidewalk
Loud merengue music is played deep into the heat of night boils
The music rises and burns from outdoor backyard patios and fries sizzle in the sun
Cold pushcarts carrying blocks of ice are pushed over cracked sidewalks
The sound of shaved ice as colorful flavors mix and melt in the day’s oppressive simmer
Thermometers reach triple digits
young women wear tight fitting shorts revealing their ass curves
Old women walk with black umbrellas posing as parasols
Young boys and men play baseball in traffic with green tennis balls a steel bat a square strike zone drawn on a post office red brick wall
People scatter as the ball is punished by the bat - zooms across the street at a rapid rate
Screams and laughter outside my dark window
Fights break out and nobody calls the cops
Grown men sit around squared tables and throw down white polka doted dominos
blunt marijuana smoke hangs in the humid air
cold beer and frozen water sales rise for bodegas
Iced coolers containing cold drinks and hotdogs get dragged and carried to the street
The black get blacker
The light skinned turn brown
The fair skinned burn
Young men stroll the hood in white wife beaters and play basketball bare-chested
hallway doors are propped open for a nonexistent breeze
street merchants fill the side walk selling junk at discount prices
way uptown in Washington Heights everybody waits for the sun to go down

my phone is dying

talking fast
the battery won’t last
my phone is dying
it keeps on crying
it beeps and beeps
to tell me the battery is depleted
A new charge is needed
this phone call will end
can’t talk with my friends
all my phone numbers are locked inside this device
keeps singling me it’s out of life
my charger’s at home
I say fuck this stupid ass phone
Cell phones attached to waistbands
hanging out in pockets
swimming around in bags and purses
the cell rings I begin another frantic search
then curse when on its 5th ring the phone still can’t be located
Then the worst thing imaginable happens
the phone gets lost
The dreaded upheaval
It needs retrieval
You feel it in your chest
when your phone can’t be located you get stressed then depressed
Losing a phone is like losing your child
it's like a lover
always with you close by at your side
you call your phone from a prehistoric landline
and hear it ring again and again you hear your own voice message
you retrace your steps
go into stores
call the subway lost and found
but it still can’t be found.
The only number you remember is your own and your mother’s
Instantly you’ve lost all your contacts
all your friends your associates
if you’d simply blue toothed the numbers to your home computer
You sink to think of all the calls you’re missing
Yet you can still retrieve your voice messages
which merely serves to cause more anguish
you make a list of the people in your phone
suddenly you feel so alone
you weep and cry and moan
you could die
you want to hold a funeral service for your lost phone but you can’t call anyone to come
You dread the possibility that you may need to make new contacts and friends
you listen to your voice mail as people call again and again
they start to worry that something is wrong
you visualize all the texts coming in all un-replied
you see how much you have relied on technology
all your ring tones and mp3’s gone for eternity
You become religious and pray that the person who found it will have mercy on your soul they will call you to tell you they found your cell
But your phone is lost
how can they call you?
you hope and pray that maybe they will call one of your friends and they will
tell them who you are
You have nightmares that somebody is putting their grimy little hands on your phone
looking through all the nude pictures you sent to your lover
crank calling your contacts
these are the hard facts
you put up flyers around the neighborhood that read
“missing” with a snap shot of your
blackberry
iphone
flip phone
your sidekick
your rumors
you call your mom’s number
since suddenly she’s your only friend
she doesn’t even know what texting is
Your heart is broken - all hope is lost
you think maybe I should tell my service provider about all this
it’s too late international charges have been racked up
calls to Santa Domingo
London
Columbia
Tanzania
places you never heard of
all the service provider can do is offer you a new phone if you re-up for another year
You go to work depressed
try to recreate some semblance of your numbers
you ask a friend at work for her number
you become a detective, “Hey do you happen to know Lori’s number?”
You manage to get three numbers from there
you call each friend and accumulate more numbers
you wonder how you could make such a blunder
Your contacts are now at six
you sit shiva and cry because this time your phone has really died