This poem links slavery, the prison-industrial complex, police brutality, and anti-Blackness, from resistance to the Black Lives Matter movement to lynchings. The imagery I provide depicts this cycle of historical anti-Blackness, anti-Black violence and exploitation, prison-slave labour, and government programs like financial aid.
In depicting this cycle, I discuss the anger and feeling of entrapment when being silenced while speaking out in defence of Black life, of witnessing the cycle of anti-Blackness in motion, and the refusal to succumb to it.
I narrate this poem in the first person, emphasizing the importance of the body carrying ancestry, memory, Black history, futurity, and community. First-person narrative provides an opportunity for an ethical and non-extractive reading of my piece, meaning that the audience has the means to position themselves within the context of the physical, mental, and historical impact of anti-Blackness.
As such, this poem’s narrative undoubtedly reflects my existence as a Black person, but also encompasses many other Black folks’ experiences and existences.
Content warning: this poem utilizes the n-word, includes graphic descriptions of violence.
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees
Ends up being what you feed on
Cornrows and shackled feet
Walking whistling cool rhythms and blues
The same tunes you bump your blonde
Locks to
Cornrows and shackled feet shuffling down
Cold corridors
All so the white man sporting a toupée
Can bask in his economic gain
Mama
My pain all goes to capitalistic gain
So you’re telling me that the orange monster is gonna
Extort my labour for the stupid swamp drain
You’re telling me that that oompa loompa looking, executive order writing, grab em by the…
Wait. Let me refrain
When I look outside my window
I don’t get no peace of mind
Shit, when I look outside my window
The only thing I can find
Are those that vowed to protect and serve
Are only here to threat and strike a nerve
Cries on the street begging not to kill
Apprehensive responses remind me
That this society is ill
I’m bloodthirsty for justice
Waterboarded by corruption and destruction
White men in hoods are the only thing that encompass
Me, in my melanin in shackles
I can’t break off
Rusting metal shackles infecting my skin
For 400 years
Four hundred years, and these rusting metal shackles
Embedded in my skin
A part of me; shit, they gon be passed on
To my next of kin
Wrap it up tight in a nice little bow
But oh no
No child of mine will ever know what it feels like
To have the same white boot on the
Back of my neck
The same white boot that forces me to live on
Welfare checks
Four hundred years later and I’m rocking white nooses
Instead of gold chains
Lying in my daddy’s bloodstains
House nigga, so I gotta wring out
Twelve’s uniform
With centuries-old Black blood down the
Drain
And my speech,
My speech
Try one more time to censor this blackbird’s
Pretty little melody and watch
As this blackbird incessantly sings the tunes that
Make your white ears bleed
Watch as this strange fruit becomes free
From the branches that suck the air out
My lungs
This Black body will not be hung
On the poplar tree
This Black body will not be your feed
Strange fruit ain’t about to be hung on
The poplar tree
