Children of the n-word…

HIM
say it’s not simple. It’s complicated, more nuanced than that.
HIM
say, I dunno. I must borrow Levar Burton’s word on the word.
HIM
say that’s him stand and him sticking to it, history be damned.
H’M
I say; oh, say can you see—the n-word as a Moby dick—
Ejaculating strychnine sperm?

Try thinking like a Tamir Rice-aged boy—immaculate navy blue
Cub Scout uniform, cap and gold kerchief. Dozens of other blue-
clad South L.A. lads, Hollywood Bowl: “Go home, chocolate drops!”
reigning down from hills above in thick flocks of dirt rocks from blonde
bombers, same blue uniforms…
Try thinking like a thirteen-year-old snatched from the truck he was
parking: reaching for ID demanded, to counterpoint of a tobacco juice-dripping growl, “Keep still, punk, or I’ll bust your damn head open!”

Try thinking like a ten-year-old: U.S. Air Force base, Roswell, NM.
Chalk children, hiding, bang his head with the door—punctuate with
n-words. It didn’t stop there. On and on and on it goes; n-words and
barbaric acts; n-words, auction block bastard offspring belonging in
Museums, along with shackles, chains—and capitalism!
Thinking, speaking like a child is hard. Perhaps wily words,
Products of plantation poets’ fertile imaginations are easier?

“I reckon dere wuz forty ob de niggers, young an’ ol’,
Dat staid about de big house jes to do what dey wuz tol’;
Dey had a’ easy time, wid skacely any work at all—
But dey had to come a-runnin’ when ol’ Mahsr John’ u’d call!”

“So you thought ‘twas Souf Ca’lina, sah, whar I was born an’ raised?
No! I’m from ole Virginny, an’ fur dat de Lord be praised!
Virginny niggers always wuz de best dat you could buy;
Poor white trash couldn’t git ‘em, ca’se de prices wuz so high.”

And so, I bequeath my dear sir 16 pages of complicated slurs—32
Depending on type-size—for stuffing his glass pipe and smoking:

‘FUBU:’ Farmers Used to Buy Us’, ‘Antique Farm Equipment:’
elderly, enslaved Africans; ‘wind chimes:’ multiple lynch
Victims; ‘criminal factory:’ pregnant Black woman; ‘crime-stopper:’
African-American woman aborting; ‘925:’ police code suburban
L.A, for ‘suspicious person’; ARF: African Rock Fish, Jones Beach,
NYC, mocking Black swimming; boy, boogie, bobblehead, BMW,
boffer, Branch Manager, Brillo Pad, buck, Buckwheat, Bur Head,
cargo, chain-dragger, chicken bandit, coal miner, Colonel’s Kids,
conky, coon, Cornelius, cotton-picker, Cream of Wheat, cuff, curb-
biter, DFN, DAN, defendant, Deuce, Double A, DWB, eggplant, eight
ball, elevator operator, Fat Albert, Feb, Future Inmate, Gatorbait, Ghetto
Hamster, Gutter Monkey, Hambone, jellybean, jigaboo, jungle bunny,
KFC, Ni-ni, NFT, Niggabyte, Niggapotomous, Nigger mortis—just a
Deadly few!

Maybe he’s heard: MARTA: ‘Moving Africans Rapidly Through Atlanta?’
‘Lincoln’s Mistake?’

Former forklift driver/warehouse worker/janitor, Raymond Nat Turner is a NYC poet; BAR's Poet-in-Residence; and founder/co-leader of the jazz-poetry ensemble UpSurge!NYC. Read other articles by Raymond Nat, or visit Raymond Nat's website.