To the White Women Who Formed a Line Between Black Protestors and Police
Thanks, but you owed us that. Almost every slave ship captain, Confederate officer, Grand Cyclops, Tulsa rioter, lynch mobber, redliner, biased judge, and killer cop started out as your baby boy.
Almost anything good about men is often a credit to their mother.
Maybe you lost the battle for their souls to their fathers who used your neck to sharpen their canine and bicuspids.
Maybe their empire building, hunger for wealth and power, appetite for violence, and need to keep their boot on somebody’s neck is some misguided effort to gain your approval or your affection.
Maybe there was just something bitter in the milk?
If you could smell their colicky breaths again, would you hug them to death?
— Frank X Walker
Frank X Walker is a Poet Laureate of Kentucky and a founding member of the Affrilachian Poets, having divined the word “Affrilachia,” underscoring the presence of African Americans in Appalachia.
