WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.890 align:middle line:84%
All right, I'm going to read
a few poems from my book,

00:00:01.890 --> 00:00:03.840 align:middle line:84%
I Can't Talk about the
Trees without the Blood.

00:00:03.840 --> 00:00:04.882 align:middle line:90%
Let's start with Rihanna.

00:00:04.882 --> 00:00:08.242 align:middle line:90%


00:00:08.242 --> 00:00:09.700 align:middle line:84%
I'm feeling a little
sassy tonight,

00:00:09.700 --> 00:00:10.780 align:middle line:84%
so I'll tell you a little
backstory on this poem.

00:00:10.780 --> 00:00:13.140 align:middle line:84%
When I wrote this in grad
school, one of my professors

00:00:13.140 --> 00:00:14.015 align:middle line:90%
said, this scares me.

00:00:14.015 --> 00:00:15.938 align:middle line:90%
You should never published it.

00:00:15.938 --> 00:00:17.730 align:middle line:84%
Which was my sign that
I should publish it,

00:00:17.730 --> 00:00:21.610 align:middle line:84%
and then I won a
Pushcart prize, so.

00:00:21.610 --> 00:00:24.690 align:middle line:84%
"BBHMM" (after watching
the music video.)

00:00:24.690 --> 00:00:27.150 align:middle line:84%
I too want to be
naked, zebra-striped

00:00:27.150 --> 00:00:29.100 align:middle line:84%
in the almost dried
accountant's blood,

00:00:29.100 --> 00:00:32.040 align:middle line:84%
sticky and sucking a fat
blunt inside Louis Vuitton

00:00:32.040 --> 00:00:34.560 align:middle line:84%
suitcase, brimming
with the newest money.

00:00:34.560 --> 00:00:37.270 align:middle line:84%
This is another way
to see myself too.

00:00:37.270 --> 00:00:39.720 align:middle line:84%
And the way Rihanna
nooses a white woman up

00:00:39.720 --> 00:00:42.870 align:middle line:84%
by her smooth feet, a
blue-blooded pendulum swinging,

00:00:42.870 --> 00:00:45.970 align:middle line:84%
as her beautiful tits look
more perfect than ever.

00:00:45.970 --> 00:00:47.580 align:middle line:90%
Why did that image excite me so?

00:00:47.580 --> 00:00:50.100 align:middle line:84%
No, not the tits, but
the simulated lynching.

00:00:50.100 --> 00:00:52.440 align:middle line:84%
It feels so damn
delicious to say bitch,

00:00:52.440 --> 00:00:56.103 align:middle line:84%
bitch better, bitch better
have my money inside my mouth.

00:00:56.103 --> 00:00:58.020 align:middle line:84%
I hate it when people
talk about Black artists

00:00:58.020 --> 00:00:58.950 align:middle line:90%
being capitalists.

00:00:58.950 --> 00:01:01.170 align:middle line:84%
Why can't we thrive in
something rich and green too?

00:01:01.170 --> 00:01:02.580 align:middle line:90%
And let us be loud about it.

00:01:02.580 --> 00:01:05.467 align:middle line:84%
Let us be loud
without consequence.

00:01:05.467 --> 00:01:07.050 align:middle line:84%
Remember when we
were dating, I wanted

00:01:07.050 --> 00:01:09.030 align:middle line:84%
you to pay for every
meal, and yes, the movies

00:01:09.030 --> 00:01:12.750 align:middle line:84%
taught me that love was someone
reaching for the check first.

00:01:12.750 --> 00:01:14.740 align:middle line:84%
But there is no such
thing as a free lunch.

00:01:14.740 --> 00:01:17.067 align:middle line:84%
Someone has to pay with
the fruit from their body.

00:01:17.067 --> 00:01:18.900 align:middle line:84%
Yeah, I'm spreading my
legs for someone else

00:01:18.900 --> 00:01:21.840 align:middle line:84%
because I'm hungry and always at
the end of some kind of altar.

00:01:21.840 --> 00:01:24.240 align:middle line:84%
Even now, I'm paying
for my doctor to reach

00:01:24.240 --> 00:01:27.900 align:middle line:84%
and scrape inside me to
say I don't have cancer.

00:01:27.900 --> 00:01:29.910 align:middle line:84%
She tells me I need
to start thinking

00:01:29.910 --> 00:01:32.850 align:middle line:90%
about babies because of my age.

00:01:32.850 --> 00:01:35.190 align:middle line:90%
I think, bitch, I'm not ready.

00:01:35.190 --> 00:01:37.020 align:middle line:84%
There will always be
tithes and offerings.

00:01:37.020 --> 00:01:39.000 align:middle line:84%
At my church, they
called it first fruits.

00:01:39.000 --> 00:01:41.010 align:middle line:84%
My mother gave me
quarters, and as a kid,

00:01:41.010 --> 00:01:43.050 align:middle line:84%
I waited for the
clink at the bottom

00:01:43.050 --> 00:01:45.210 align:middle line:90%
of the bucket being passed.

00:01:45.210 --> 00:01:47.460 align:middle line:90%
I believe God heard this too.

00:01:47.460 --> 00:01:49.620 align:middle line:84%
Somewhere, someone
is counting the cash

00:01:49.620 --> 00:01:50.940 align:middle line:90%
behind a velvet curtain.

00:01:50.940 --> 00:01:53.583 align:middle line:84%
Once, a boy said, suck it bitch,
with this heavy dense hand

00:01:53.583 --> 00:01:56.250 align:middle line:84%
at the back of my head, pushing,
pushing as another way to mean,

00:01:56.250 --> 00:01:57.420 align:middle line:90%
pay me what you owe me.

00:01:57.420 --> 00:01:58.440 align:middle line:90%
I didn't forget.

00:01:58.440 --> 00:02:00.630 align:middle line:84%
Yeah, I see the total at
the bottom of the receipt.

00:02:00.630 --> 00:02:01.620 align:middle line:90%
I have so much debt.

00:02:01.620 --> 00:02:04.850 align:middle line:90%
I'm forever in the wettest red.

00:02:04.850 --> 00:02:06.000 align:middle line:90%