"Why I Observe the Sabbath at Home in the D" by Melba Joyce Boyd

the slow kill is 
a ruthless dirge
bestowed on children 
beveled in star spangled
irreligious wars
over oil or vanishing
sweet waters
while political thugs
betray language
and hide behind skin
tone and trickery like
vindictive republicans
and nonliterary 
news announcers
choking on gasoline 
fumes gulping the
Gulf of Mexico
as drug dealers in
disguise sneak 
across border lines
not to pick
oranges, or tobacco,
or strawberries fields
laden with pesticides
of transient cancers 
or corn genetically 
grown for lactating 
breasts of chickens 
and teenagers 
breeding like livestock 
criminalized at birth
to fit the description
as by- products for 
the prison industry or 
hypnosis by X-boxes,
romance gangsta songs
and infractions of 
demented movie stars 
who never visit the 
dark side of Detroit,
Newark, Cleveland or
Spanish- speaking 
Chicago or L.A. or
any urban reservation
where desperation 
breeds athletes 
for battlefields
on 2-D distractions
if they can duck
that bullet shot
below the hoop, 
across playground 
perimeters, 
a hit meant
for Antoyne, 
DeAndre’s  cousin 
who spells his name 
with a “y”
to make him feel special 
when his mama calls 
his name before 
an incidental,
insult of vocabulary 
incites someone’s 
paranoid, frenetic,
delusional child 
toting an automatic
to celebrate himself
on TV’s First 48 
while his parents 
disappear inside 
supersized churches 
hoisting misery 
like pagan sacrifices 
for gilded prophets 
sporting blue, 
alligator shoes 
and gold-toothed 
grins that glitter 
when abusing 
the Bible,
misquoting Matthew, 
Mark, Luke, John,
and the Apostle Paul,
dancing preachers 
dredging up testaments 
condemning material 
enslavement and 
promising life 
after Jesus’ death 
paid for in platinum 
offering plates sucking 
juice out the side 
of bent necks 
of faithful flocks
to put premium gas 
in luxury convertibles
with chrome hub caps
spinning in reverse, 
in sync with wall street 
investors confiscating 
cityscapes by burning 
houses on Halloween eve,
disabling maple trees,
ravaging evergreens,
damning rivers, 
offending  any 
semblance of 
justice until
memories curdle
in shadows of 
premature death
and black streaks
of light appear
on tombstones
like hieroglyphic
tattoos encrypting
mortal damnation.