“Splashpad” featured on Human/Kind Journal
Biggup Human/Kind Journal for featuring my poem “Splashpad.”
You can read “Splashpad” and other poems on their site here.
https://www.humankindjournal.org/humanities/a-poem-by-chris-burton
Lupus?! A wha dat?!
Just another emcee who gets free. Vessel of philanthropic vision fueled by theophilic purpose.
Tag: poetry
May 10, 2020
For Aunt Phyllis/For Mother’s Day
I wish for you to dance again
I wish for you to be healed
I wish for you to feel the wind in your hair
I wish for you to be whole
I wish for you to laugh
A deep, belly laugh
The kind where tears fill your eyes
I wish they were the only tears you shed
I wish for you to remember
And feel warm
Surrounded by past moments
I wish for you to feel loved
I wish for you to sing
Sing a new song
Lift your head to the heavens
Remember your help
I wish for you to feel full
The completion of a life well lived
The ease of having run your race
You ran it well
I wish for you to know joy
Deep refreshing joy
The kind that puts a smile on your face
When it doesn’t make sense
I’ll do what I can
God knows I do what I can
To make it make sense
February 1, 2020
I couldn’t call when You were dying
I’ve let my loved ones know
That in the event I’m on a plane
And think that I have arrived
At the end
I won’t make a phone call
No terror, or reminders of love
No semblance of intimacy thousands of feet in the air
No delusions of a life wrapped with a bow
Too dissimilar to death’s scar
The jagged pieces of lives shattered to pretend that we can ever truly be prepared
Earthquakes happen so frequent
We believe it’s man’s machinations
A revelation of Revelations
Or Mother Earth’s menstrual cramps
How regular and majestic
Coupled with threats of tsunami that kept me refreshing the page until the alert fell asleep
I forced myself awake determined not to find Wednesday with news you were no more
I opened WhatsApp to close it
Texted then wiped it away
Impersonal at the very least
And that’s never my intent
So I relearned that inaction is an action
And determined that I’d rather refresh then prepare myself for a final conversation
We’ve been doing so much better!
Rebuilding what never was
Though false alarm
I’m reminded that my instinct is well founded
A monument to catastrophe
How small we are in the face of the ineffable
February 25, 2018
Gardening
Dutty tuff doh, don’t it?
Miracles mi Lawd, miracles
Memba when we never expect a rice grain
Now we plate abundant and water a flow
Wha? Unnu think when you pray the prayer of Jabez
Poopa Jesus only have material things in fi him closet?
Repair better than reparations
Forgive without a man say sorry
But when him sorry?
Bitter tears tun sweet
Impossible, invincible things a gwan
Like falling in love with the wutless
January 10, 2018
Ab(solve)
i absolved You for myself!
i did it stealth.
Not for my wealth to accumulate when i humiliate my foes.
Am i gaining weight when i step on Your toes?
my heart burns at the suggestion that i should hate You.
Indiscretions pathetic yet i left You lesser in Your lessons
Your Mistake did not predate my absolution
it wasn’t immediate or without confusion
partly regretted i never asserted dominance
neglecting the puffed chest whose exhale is ominous
it’s obvious!
averted eyes, rapid glance
but it is of no matter
i will give You a chance to clear history,
my health matters more than my hubris
Scales measure Our friendship
can i really lose this?
afford the discord perhaps, but the scars stain still, no changing that
January 4, 2016
Sorry, Doc.
Wanted to apologize for last night.
You came in to do your job
And my elder only saw your youth.
“You’re a doctor?!” she exclaimed,
“I thought you were a nurse!”
Subsequent conversation was unpleasant.
I was not offended but understood
Your grasps for authority.
My elder could not see
How her question accused you.
Fulfilling for a moment your fears
Of being an impostor.
And I’ve felt it.
Like no matter what I do,
Take me to Oslo,
And my aunt will always see me as six.
Take me to Richmond,
I’ll give you a speech
And they’ll still ask if I am from Africa.
Eventually.
The horror of being lowered.
You being a nurse is like me being a janitor or some thing.
But I’ve learned so much from custodians.
Lunch ladies and the least of these.
These people, my people
Respectable carrying receptacles.
Walked so we could run away.
April 3, 2015
Mi nuh know
(Picture taken from https://scoutdog.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/looking-out-window-6-7-07-001.jpg)
Youse a stupid dog.
Wha yuh a look fah een?
Deh deh a look pon window…wha yuh tink?
Parousia nah start today, papa.
Yuh nuh see seh we nuh ready?
Bwoy mi tell yuh!
I think Jesus show up right ya now we’d kill him again.
In all a him glory (tell the story!)
We so fool fool, we see him and tink seh
Di big man fit di description.
Bwoy mi nuh know!
Yuh tink dem woulda stop and frisk mi King?
Have a picnic, put a fiyah pon a cross or wha?
Baptize wid di firehose.
Last supper wid skittles.
Iced tea a fi wi blood type.
Mi like him, me’d a show up as a dawg.
No mongrel to wi ting.
Haffi purebred.
Collie.
Retriever.
Deh yah a wait pon mi Shepherd still.
November 4, 2014
unravelinG
Loathe this place.
Always showing up for dinner, forever on the menu.
Unspoken speeches turned tourniquet,
The Educator must entertain.
You cesspool of spiritual violence
A blasphemy incarnate.
You promise me an audience for oratory
Yet have no interest in others’ story.
I cactus here.
Remember.
Love sustain I.
September 17, 2014
Pancakes (Sticky out deh, een?!)
I’m ashamed that I buy Aunt Jemima pancakes.
I could probably eat pancakes everyday.
they say abs are made in the kitchen but for real
if i gotta give up pancakes to get a six-pack, screw a six-pack.
bri still loves me and so does Jesus.
how am i supposed to give up pancakes?
would eating hungry jack make me more just?
what if next week i learn that hungry jack was a tool of oppression too?
i’m scared.
Pancakes might mean too much to me.
But I listen to Shabba Ranks when I eat pancakes.
I’m in my kitchen when I eat pancakes.
It’s saturday when I eat pancakes.
Grandma is still alive when I eat pancakes.
Don’t know if my hands will ever get clean.
June 30, 2014
Without Works
For Patricia.
When does politeness solve poverty?
Can saying “God Bless You” solve a rumbling belly?
Is there solace in your sincerity that you don’t carry cash?
Or is it just plastic?
Patricia asked me if we talk about poor people in my studies.
“Only in electives,” I said regrettably.
(Like my ivory tower tears quench thirst.)
I get heartbroken hearing about Chicago’s southside.
Eyes welled up on Newark’s Bergen Street.
But survivor’s guilt ain’t helping nobody live.
Lupus?! A wha dat?! 