of broomsticks. Over the floor. Marital law.
The jump off movement. Movement: rhythm
and blues. Hip sways, acoustic. Wind of the
waist not want not case. Sign of improvement.
Movement: grind to unwind. The muse of
music. Even tonight, she moves despite how
dark her blues get.
Noose swings like a pendulum. Whip/crack
a/cross back, again. Simon bids his help and
then … DJs two worlds blend.
CHAPTER 9
Feel the music. Son, we got you programmed
like a beat. When I press snare, Yo, guard your
grill. Press kick, you move your feet. You can’t
compete. Got my hydrants parked on every
street. I’m federal, NGH. Son of Sun. Come
close and feel the heat.
I am the streets. The white lines only separate
me from me. You hydroplane in false god’s
name and still crash into me. Sign and tree,
mountainside, guardrail into the sea. They
thought they stole you from my arms then
carried you to me.
Here’s the key. DNA encoded in a beat.
White rocks in a vial, NGH, ain’t got nuthin
on me. BCH, I’m free. Ask these editors at
MTV. Far as they know they’re publishing
some new school poetry. Let it be. ‘Cause
even that will do to turn the key. Doorways
into other worlds. The truth shall set you free.
You are me. I am you. But also I am he.
Shepherd of a bastard flock that grazes in
the streets.
Feel the beat. Nod your head. Lean back. Yo,
touch your feet. Let me see you pop that
thang right there, girl, in your seat. Feel the
heat. Count this page amongst your whitest
sheets. Comfort in my every word. Slide under.
Countless sheep.
CHAPTER 10
Hail Mary, Mother of God. Got the whole
host of angels shuffling in my iPod. NGHs
learned to raise their voices when I lowered
my rod. Staff of Moses. Pharaoh knows it.
Son, my word is my bond.
Tune my heart with my mind. Speak my nature.
Divine. Called this shit into existence back in ’79.
With the future in my pocket. Tightly gripped
like a nine. Keep my finger on the trigger. Waitin
for the right time.
CHAPTER 11
Ancient NGHs align! Path of cosmic design.
Blood of kings ‘cause Saturn’s rings don’t
need no diamonds to shine. Yes, the reason
for the season. Ornamented, divine. Coded
language of the mystics with my fist
in the sky.
Keep your head up. We represent the
real, my NGH. Dead up. Book of the
Dead. History bled. This NGH fed up.
Led us to despair, some into prayer,
and they won’t let up until they got us
worshipping them false gods instead
of the realness.
God of the streets. My NGHs feel this. We
nod our heads and worship through beats.
Go ’head and kneel. It’s the love that makes
the cipher complete. And it’s displayed
through the way the bass line marries the beat.
CHAPTER 12
Yesh, Yesh y’all. You don’t stop. I spill
some liquid for my NGHs on the stop
clock. Then shake the hands of time. I
got him for his wristwatch. I got a second
wind and shook him, like in hopscotch.
Jumped the turnstile, turned, smiled, gestured:
hand crotch. Double-cross a motherfucker
’fore I get got.
Caught in the crossfire. Brought
over seas, you were caught in the
crossfire. Down on your knees,
you were caught in the crossfire.
Yeshua, please help us out of the
crossfire. The cross fire.
Caught in the crossfire. The KKK
had you caught in the crossfire.
Prayed every day, you were caught
in the crossfire. In Jesus name, you
were caught in the crossfire. The
CHAPTER 13
Get up and walk, NGH. You the one
we was waitin for. Way before dem
Latin books bastardized the sacred law.
Made a NGH question. Mark of the beast:
deceased. Guess what’s in-store? Wait for
it to register. Now, empty out that register, NGH.
And keep your hands in the sky. You the money
and the power. Get that green out your eye.
Oblivious. Hoodwinked back to black. These
NGHs wearing crosses. The shirts off their
back. Pay cash out your ass for that diamond
crack. Smoke rock-roll away or your money back.
Whipped and burned. NGH, you done
carried the cross. Made Milano a fan.
Black Madonna’s the boss. You free.
Half the cost. Grace maze. Now you’re lost.
Man-child in the mirror. The picture’s getting
clearer and it’s you.
I crossed that bridge in ’72. JB played
the funky drummer. Now these fools playin
you. A lie preserved in stained glass doesn’t
make it more true. Survey says, the little
drummer boy be drummin for you.
CHAPTER 14
Newborn king. Your moms: that fat lady that
sing. His eye on the sparrow. Point blank,
through a barrel. You bad to the bone. Cancer.
Sir, your marrow. I ordered the monkey. We
back to the barrel of laughs.
These NGHs God-body tryin to be golden
calves. Five percent on the corner of pure
science and math. While the eighty-five divide
their time between dead end paths. And the ten
percent have spent their rent on wars fiery wrath.
Dead Sirius. Waitin for damned self’s return
to true self. True health. True school. New book
on old shelf. I, self, lord and master. Choose one
path. Move faster.
CHAPTER 15
Yeah, though I walk still talk the talk. Exorcisin
all these demons. Black board and chalk. From the
brightest constellation on land, New York. To the
origin of darkness. BREAK/POP the cork.
To all the battles fought. All the captives caught.
Lives sold and bought. Enslaved for naught.
’Cause today, we ‘bout to make this freedom a
sport. Leave your jewelry in the bleachers. Come
take the court.
Yo the banana peels are carefully placed. So keep
your shell toes carefully laced. The illest NGH got
peppered and maced. Now amplify this. Turn up
the bass. And think about it.
CHAPTER 16
Picture me, lampin’ in the company car. Rims
like Tibetan prayer wheels. NGH WHT? I’m
a star. I cruise the block like a feather back and
forth ‘til I land as the song in your ear or the
book in your hand. Now the whole fuckin world
’bout to know who I am.
Got your whole system up in my trunk. That ‘dog
eat dog’ make my woofers bark: atomic crunk All
my trill NGHs know who be bringin da funk. Lees
and shell toes like it’s Black History Month.
CHAPTER 17
Son of a vortex. African r
oots. That chicken foot
hex. Binary star NASA can’t compute. Linear
complex. It’s simple. Bloodlines span from
Lalībela temples straight to chitterling minstrels.
Spin it back to the intro.
There was one. Bore witness to the rays of the
sun. Synthesized in her own image. Photo negative.
Shun. The development of Parliament. The phallic
bop gun. Thus, the mother-ship connection spawned
the birth of the drum.
Ancient drum begat drum. Kingdom go. Kingdom
come. Ancient sector of the scepter risen up to the
sun. Hidden hand of man begat patented clone of
the drum. Boom Bap strapped into a wire, tightly
coiled, and re-spun.
Trigger sound. Trigger gun. Drum machine. Machine
gun. Bodies piled. Carefully filed under beats that were
once reprogrammed to become: unplugged concert of
sun. Every ray with sample clearance. Every two begat one.
Boom Bap hard as a gun. White cross-trainers, unstrung.
Let these suckas know the cost of making Harriet run.
Let the North Star be your guiding post when turned
from the sun until knowledge reigns supreme over
nearly everyone.
CHAPTER 18
Check it out now! Check me out now!
I let these MTHRFKRs know what I’m
about now. And ain’t no way no one could
ever play me out now. Because I represent
the present, NGH, right now!
Check it out now! Check me out now! At the
helm of the ship. Shipping out, now! NGH us
angel dust and devout, now! Heaven high as
the sky. Never come down!
CHAPTER 19
Attention: another dimension. Another
complicated twist too twisted to mention.
Another pair of NGH lips tongue-tied to
perfection. Another frame of mind exists
beyond comprehension.
Attention. Fourth realm of ascension.
The absence of tension. A corporate lynching.
Their god is their henchman. And he ain’t
just pinching. This NGH bites! And, according
to pictures, this NGH white!
WHT?! Come down SLCTR rum pumpum
pum! Me keeps me tremor in me pocket. Come
and get some! Again! Come down SLCTR rum
pumpum pum! Me keeps me tremor in me pocket.
Come and get some!
Gimme diamond. Gimme gold. Gimme sugar.
Gimme candy. Me wine and me handy and dat
in me panty.
A stoppa! Na issa supa cat manna you a na lingo.
Tell him to come back. Tell him he a murderer. Tell
him mamma womb a she da real carrier. Woman
no a cry a you a no suffer. Tell him come a man
a who a no batter. Have mercy.
CHAPTER 20
Let me mold a guitar of your bodily bazaar.
Strap your tongue, chord your lungs, string
your toes. And bows that precede the rain
shall serpent symphonies in your name.
Mother of countless daughters. The tricks of
time. It is your thrust and grind that defines
us. We are the offspring of your decapitated
head. The bastard sons of Father Time.
Let Saturn be reborn a girl. Let her nurture
her children rather than eat them. Hide them
from our forefathers and the angry ghosts
of X-mas past. Let them be raised away from
the phallic dangers of our times.
Let their secrets remain secrets until we are
ready to cherish them as our own. Nurture
and adore them. The timeless secrets of
creation:
The darkness that yields light. The seed that
bears fruit. The mother that bears the cross
of her fathers and her fathers’ fathers who
beat her when she bore no sons. His raised
fist the original Boom Bap.
Spin that record backwards. Nigger to NGH.
Before before. John the Boom Baptist. Bring
me his head. His dick. His eyes and teeth. His
arms and feet. Bring me all that is mine, all that
has been buried, scattered or lost until history
is ours again.
Mothers of night and windsong. Daughters of dust
and detriment. Nameless. Fuck it. Let them remain
nameless. It won’t stop their truth from prevailing.
Because it is not written. Because it don’t matter
anyway. Because there’s nothing you can do about
it. Because there’s no excuse, no explanation.
And that is reason enough to
Dance. Even when your feet hurt.
Dance like the fires of hell are upon
you and you’re dodging every flame.
Dance when it tastes good.
Dance when the spirit moves you.
Dance because you feel it and you don’t
have to be taught how to count, how to step
and slide, how to twirl and jump and land
on a good foot before taking off to fly,
NGH, dance. Dance, nigger. Paint your faces.
Shine your shoes. Pop that collar. Shake it.
Wind it. Kick fight scratch rip kill BREAK.
Neck back jump back kiss BREAK.
Uprock freeze pop lock BREAK.
Don’t stop don’t stop snap BREAK.
Into ferocious song and dance. Calculated
movement. Gestures of prayer and invocation.
Dance. Your life depends on it.
Cakewalk. Lindy. Charleston Mashed potatoes.
Camel walk. Hot pants. Hustle. Electric boogaloo.
Patty Duke. Steve Martin. Pee-wee Herman.
Prep. Wop. Rooftop. Cabbage Patch. Chicken
head. Ragtop. Wobble. Crump. Snake. BREAK!
CHAPTER 21
You wish you could dance like this! You wish!
Standin there. High postin. You wish. “And our
American Idol is Fantasia.”
“You know you want me, Mickey. You
can’t afford me, though. My name is Saturn,
Pluto. I ain’t no Disney ho.”
Sing it, girl. Sing it. Southern trees bear
strange WHT?! Sometimes I feel like a
motherless WHT?! Drop beats like bombs
in Alabama churches, Afghani libraries,
New Jersey turnpike, the sphinx’s nose,
crack in Compton, AIDS in Africa, small
pox in blankets, blue-eyed Jesus, the Holy
Ghost and all dem other covered women,
fallen soldiers and noblemen.
Mother turned whore turn in graves
turn to each other and help us over-
turn tables.
Turntables. Nails sharp as needles.
Vaseline on faces. Scratch scratch
scratch scratch.
BREAK BREAK
Scratch scratch
scratch scratch.
BREAK BREAK
Kick kick snare.
BREAK
Scratch kick snare.
BREAK
Snare kick, kick. Kick, snare. Snare
kick. Snare. Snare kick, kick, kick,
kick, kick, kick kick, snare.
Snare kick, kick. Kick, snare. Snare
kick. Snare. Snare kick, kick, kick,
kick, kick, kick kick, snare.
Snare kick, kick. Kick, snare. Snare
kick. Snare. Snare kick, kick, kick,
kick, kick, kick kick, snare.
Snare kick, kick. Kick, snare. Snare
kick. Snare. Snare kick, kick, kick,
kick, kick, kick kick, snare.
Chop and screw it.
BREAK it down beneath labyrinthine
corridors of anguish and despair. The
chamber the bullet travels. Chamber of
commerce. Tunnel vision of the train
over tracks …
CHAPTER 22
Not until you listen to RKM on a rocky
mountaintop have you heard hip-hop.
Extract the urban element that created it
and let an open wide countryside illustrate it.
Riding on a freight train in the freezing
rain listening to Coltrane. My reality went
insane and I think I saw Jesus. He was
playing hopscotch with Betty Carter who
was cursing out in a scat like gibberish for
not saying butterfingers.
And my fingers run through grains of sand
like seeds of time. The pains of man.
The frames of mind which built these frames
which is the structure of our urban super-
structure.
The trains and planes could corrupt and
obstruct your planes of thought so that
you forget how to walk through the woods
which ain’t good ’cause if you never
walked through the trees listening to Nobody
Beats The Biz then you ain’t never heard
hip-hop.
CHAPTER 23
And you don’t stop. And you don’t stop.
And you must stop letting cities define you.
Confine you to that which is brick and cement.
We are not a hard people. Our domes have
been crowned with the likes of steeples.
That which is our being soars with the eagles
and the Jonathan Livingston Seagulls. Yes, I
got wings. You got wings. All God’s children
got wings. So let’s widen the circumference
of our nest and escape this urban incubator.