"It's Just Business"

“It’s Just Business”

                   1
A table set for six.
Five pieces of chicken.
One loaf of bread.
They’ll sleep with
Grumbling stomachs tonight.
Dad—not used to seeing
The sunset at home—
Eats silently.
                   Ashamed.

Meanwhile, ‘dozers
‘Doze heaps of land
To make room for
Two shiny buildings
For the shiny new staff.
They’ll eat steak tonight.

                   2
Stacy stood stunned
When they told her.
                   Lung cancer.
“But I don’t smoke,”
She told them.
Three years to live—
                   Tops.
Two decades serving
Smokers in a tiny diner.
Today she coughed her
                   Last cough.
Stacy was thirty-nine.

Meanwhile, a camel
Strolls across a desert.
His hump is swollen,
                   His belly full.
He spits at the Stacys.
He doesn’t blink.

                   3
Everyday for a month,
She put the pill
On her tongue,
Chased it with water
And swallowed.
                   Doctor’s orders.
Soon, her pain would
Be gone forever—
Whoever said
Miracles weren’t real?
Finally, a few weeks later,
Her suffering had ended…
                   And so had her life.
Drunken with loss,
Her newlywed husband
Watched as her casket
Lowered into the Earth.

Meanwhile, policy places
Profit as primary priority
And pushers prescribe
Pretty-packaged
Poison as promise
To pad the pockets
                   Of politicians.

                   4
The sweat-taster
Licked Sukey’s arm
And declared her
Healthy to work.
They checked
Her head for lice,
Her teeth for rot.
                   She passed.
The white man
Paid the other
Four hundred dollars.
With terrified eyes,
Sukey told her children
                   Goodbye.

Meanwhile, ‘massa
Lords his plantation
With commands.
He lifts naught a finger.
Collectively, they
Create an empire on
The sweaty backs of
                   Blacks.

                   5
They shot from the shore.
Matwau stood strong
As his father collapsed
Into his arms.
Blood rushed from
The man’s torso.
His headdress fell
To the ground
The boy knew was
No longer his homeland.

Meanwhile, the
Men with bullets
Ventured into the jungle,
Weeding the plants,
                   The people.
Staking the claim,
Naming their names,
Building our home
Among the land of
Milk and honey.

                   6
Bahira cries into a
Pair of bloody jeans.
                   Her son’s.
They’re crusty, stiff.
Crumpled and torn
At the knee.
They say he died instantly.
Debris and bullets
Spilling his Life
Across the pavement.
                   A “misfire.”
He was eight years old.

Meanwhile, the fearful
Rally at home.
Their “freedom is
                   At stake.”
And it’s not free.
The price is death.
And the blood has stained
Our palms.