Can you find yourself in this piece? |
I walk these ghetto streets and am Troubled by what I see Needles decorate the pavement While gun shells adorn the street God’s helpless children all around And as I tread these grounds I wonder to myself Where are we? Why don’t we seem to care? I see young girls of that tender age Growing up fast in skin tight, too short clothes, And high heeled shoes Cigarettes nestled between the painted lips Disowned, ignored, neglected, needing So they sell their priceless innocence To grown men on these streets Some supporting acquired habits Some just trying to eat And I wonder to myself Where are we? Why don’t we seem to care? I can’t fathom how we got this way We are killing our brothers and sisters Over such elementary things The young men we are rearing up To be so much less than We open their hand and put a gun in it Before we will the books that Our fathers fought and died to acquire glimpses of We are tearing each other down with Secrets, manipulations, and lies We spew out accusations at “the man” Without understanding the ways by which We are causing our own demise So I wonder to myself Where are we? Why don’t we seem to care? Our babies are raising babies Changing soiled diapers when it seems that Only a moment ago someone was changing theirs And they walk with an absent father’s seed On their hip and smile playfully when men Are surveying their bigness Pumped with this new readiness that substitutes The days when young girls waited to unveil their precious gifts Now their appearances are sensuous and Their insides titillated at the sound of men Calling “Hey Shorty!” And it pains my heart Their lack of knowledge in true womanhood And I cry Where are we? Why don’t we seem to care? Long life has been exchanged for One night stands making a segway for STD’s Thinking “not me” before walking into the free clinic To hear the most dreaded letters in our alphabet A.I.D.S. Millions of people diagnosed every time A report is printed and most being blacks Lives cut short chasing 45 seconds And I ask myself Where are we? Why don’t we seem to care? Bring back the days of Honor and virtue The days of hardworking men and TCB fathers The days when grandma wasn’t 35 The days of great leaders like the Malcolm’s and the Martin’s And cry out with loud voices I’M HERE!!!!! I CARE!!!!!! |