#forjakesake

and just like that we go from everything to nothing. a hundred miles an hour to rest in a second. dead. you can still smell the burning rubber from the trail we left behind. the skid marks tell the story of a love so passionate we had no other option but to drive off the edge of the cliff. like a dragon she breathed fire into my lungs with every kiss and made me feel like the sun, like somebody’s reason to live. she was the best thing that i never had and i was the worst thing she ever will. now when i dream about her i grab her waist as tight as i can cause i don’t want to ever let her go again. but i’m a sinking ship and i’m trying to evacuate everyone as quickly as i can. she was way too greedy, wanting me to add ‘I’s to my ‘love u’s and sprinkle some sincerity on my miss you’s. why couldn’t our daily conversations be enough for you? she ruined everything when she said ‘I’d like to get to know, the real you’ cause you see the real me is locked away in a tower and guarded by a smile that would weaken the knees of nuns, domesticate wild beasts and you, you’ve got eyes that are too precious to see past that. i never once put pen to paper when she was still around, maybe because  my lips left every poem that brewed up inside me at the base of her neck.  words scrambling up and down her body looking for a place to rest, preferably just above her left breast. she was rain on a gloomy day, a reminder that angels do cry, and when they do, it’s the most beautiful sight.

Please, don’t shoot. I understand that you may feel threatened by the richness of my heritage but please, don’t shoot. I’ve got hopes and dreams written down in my back pocket journal and I hadn’t planed to achieve them all by the time I turned 18 so please, give me a few more years. My mother has shed her fair share of tears over the past few years so please, don’t make her shed more. I hear you shot down another young man who kind of looked like me so I’m starting to feel like there’s some kind of bounty on my head. Maybe God loved having me in his kingdom so much that he offered a lifetime of fear hidden by self-righteousness to whichever one of you who could send me back to him the quickest. It may tempt you but please, don’t shoot. I know you hate the fact that I see the melanin in my skin as a blessing but Mama warned me that I may as well be a corpse if I don’t worship this epidermis. Sometimes I don’t feel safe, like my feet are poking out from underneath the duvet and on those days I hope the boogeyman is fast asleep because I reckon I’m on the top of his hit list. So please Mr Boogeyman, please, don’t shoot. I’m losing faith in this bible because it isn’t bulletproof even though the words are strung toughly together like my grandmother’s love but even she got a hole in her heart. These streets aren’t safe for me, and no matter how much music blares out my white earphones, I can still hear your eerie footsteps behind me in the back of my mind. I can still envision the black-hole of your gun barrel nuzzled against my forehead, making itself at home with the words “nigga, nigga, motherfucking nigga, nigga” rushing out your mouth like a stampede leaving every bone of my dignity shattered and bleeding black ink on the ground. my mama don’t deserve to see me like this. If you decide to kill me, please don’t plant a gun on my body. I don’t want my mother spending the rest of her days questioning her parenting. Mama, you did the best you could but you couldn’t have saved me. I know my father used to wear a crown made of gold but all I could find was this crown of thorns for myself… But my father’s first son used to wear one so, if you decide to shoot, you’ll be sending me home to Dad. I’ll try and put in a good word for you.

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