by Reverend Reynard N. Blake, Jr.
See harmful loan schemes and tricks black folks go through
Criminal justice makes prison work fruitful
Sentence black guys with the long stints they’ll bring
Greenbacks accrue from high speculating
Song Parody: Teaching White People What Racism Means
by Reverend Reynard N. Blake, Jr.
[parody based on the song, “My Favorite Things” from the movie “The Sound of Music”]
“Reverse” and “racism” is hard to fathom
White people claiming that that’s what could happen
How could this happen when white folk run things?
There are some issues worth considering
White people complain when black people get blue
Gunshots for black men when stopped by the state troops
Breathing for black men seems hard when disdained
Teaching white people why racism stings
Did Africans lynch whites and started laughing?
Was rape o.k. for white boys on slave lasses?
Serving white masters and black women chained
These were examples of white privileging
When the dogs fight
And whites see it
And the owners’ black
They’re quickly forgetting lives snuffed through lynching
But then whites don’t give a damn
[Repeating the cadence of first 4 stanzas]
White folk thought chapters of racism smitten
Whites conquered their sins and blacks knew they didn’t
Watch lender packages tied up with strings
Then some blacks lose all their financial means
See harmful loan schemes and tricks black folks go through
Criminal justice makes prison work fruitful
Sentence black guys with the long stints they’ll bring
Greenbacks accrue from high speculating
Lacking investment in schools or in transit
Low-pay has black folks’ lives shortened with hardships
Watching whites whisking black neighborhoods plain
Gentrification finds black folk leaving
When the young die
When the Right wing
Think crime’s mostly black
I’m thinking Ferguson whites feel the same things
And, then I get steaming mad
Reverend Reynard N. Blake, Jr., M. S. is an ordained Baptist minister living in East Lansing, Michigan with his wife Karen Kelly-Blake, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences at Michigan State University (MSU). He earned his Master of Science degree in Community Development-Urban Studies from MSU and a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the College of Charleston (SC). He has authored and co-authored several articles on faith-based community development and is also a poet, essayist, and social critic. His work has appeared on Black Commentator, Michigan Family Review, Op-ED.com, the Online Journal of Urban Youth Culture and Black Agenda Report. He is putting on the final touches on a book of political parody and poetry; no publisher yet. He would appreciate any input on where and how he can get it published. He can be reached at reynardblakejr@yahoo.com.
Black people must be discerning about racist attacks on DEI programs while also acknowledging that “diversity” can be a con that damages Black politics, just as it was meant to do.
Langston Hughes’s 1943 poem against fascism is precise, droll, and eternal.
The UN Security Council (UNSC) has never sanctioned Rwanda or referred its president to the International Criminal Court (ICC), despite decades of UN documentation of their international crimes in…
Ecuador was once a safe country. However, U.S. interference, the rise of neoliberal economic policies, the dollarization of its currency, and enhanced state repression have combined to worsen the…
"The fire this time … (as Amiri tolt me)" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
