I think I know this by heart.
But I don't know, the tequila might have different ideas.
But OK.
So this is my last piece.
I want to say thank you to the University of Arizona,
I want to say thank you to all of you for coming out.
Thank you for your temperatures, it's
fucking ice cold in the Midwest.
And thank you for all of, all of, all of you
who have helped me out here.
Thank you, Logan.
Thank you, Wendy.
Thank you, Cybele.
Where I sit down and sign books, or just come and say, what up?
If that's what you want to be on.
This is called "Tragicomedy of the Black Boy Blues,"
or "A Hip Hop Negrito," or "The Boy Became Black at JFK."
"Is the boy with the umbrella worried
who will protect him next?
Is his skin the color of his true love's here?
Are umbrellas totems or buildings?
Is green a color or an emotive state?
Are the boys running behind the Black boy laughing
or just baring their teeth?
Is it any different whether they spit on him
or soak him in gasoline?
Say, wither.
Say, the bath water went out with the baby Say the baby,
the Germans had to have had something right wing, see?
We were all just billboards anyway.
There is something absolutely fearless about leaving
your house in the world and going abroad
when you are Black and ruled by nothing
but fast twitch fibers and the fear of standing still.
When the instinct is all faint, and dip sharp
left to jab step, and full sprint right split knuckle,
and the rust of blood in the cheek.
If we are all to be truthful, we're
pretty sure the girl wants nothing to do with us,
but the Black boy does.
If we are all to be truthful, we can already
smell his Black flesh burning.
Can't you hear it?
The crackle of the skin, the smell of pork
rind in the air, the eyeball pop,
the drop step rhythm disappeared with the rope fibers
in the morning air?
Aren't we all just standing around watching
things fall from the sky or burn into the ether?
Where do Black boys go when they fail?
Where do Black boys go when they succeed?
Where do Black boys go when they die
when the skin is ashes to dust?
Where do black boys go when they feel the need to scale fences?
You can only move as fast as who's
in front of you, that's what the Black boy says.
Unless, you carefully slit the Achilles
tendon of a motherfucker and make him bleed to a halt.
This is the leapfrog dance in This is America.
Black boy is waiting, Black boy is waiting.
What happens to the Black boy if he just stands a still?
And three times, we made love on the banister
of her father's condo.
And three times, she told me she loved me.
And three times, she emphasized the Black part.
And three times, her eyes were flat
in the gray in the distance, except when they were green.
And three times, our sweat curled into teardrops.
And we licked every sweat drop up together
and laughed all the way to the Million Man March.
The way we love each other is not healthy,
the therapist is a predator.
The Black boy knows this, so doesn't want to go there.
The way we love each other stifles bodies into reason.
She does not know why he walks so
close to the sides of buildings, why
he dresses like all the other Black boys, why the pant sag,
why the hat is pulled so low, why he won't hang out downtown.
All she knows is, we won't love right,
but the Black boy fucks like a champion.
Elvis Presley.
Justin Timberlake.
Kenny G. Vanilla Ice.
Michael Bolton.
The White Rapper reality show.
To tell a woman you don't love her when you're both naked
is inconveniently honest, not the place for it.
If you are a Black boy, it is the only place
you can get away with it.
Shiny sweat pooling on your hip bone
as you walk away from the rubble of the bed.
Say Black boy five times fast and he will appear.
Say inky-binky spider.
Say the umbrella is just an accessory.
Say Stepin Fetchit was a legitimate actor.
Say America got it right once.
Say Tuskegee, say Emmett Till, say
Pine Ridge, say Bay of Pigs, say Michael Jackson's blood is
on all our hands.
The boy became black at JFK, he does not
know where he belongs anymore, he
hears shouts of his tropical childhood,
he listens for the sound of kite tales in the wind.
He is hip hop, he owns a green umbrella,
he's resistance music and conflict diamonds.
He's learning to love his scars, he's
making new scars of his own, they are beautiful.
Women flocked to the place where his downbeat sits.
he is blacker than ever, he is blacker than ever, he
is blacker than ever.
And he likes it."
Thank you, all.