Wrong Reason
by Burnley
I need some motivation. Maybe some inspiration. I feel like I’m in NYC and the police are choking me, I can’t breathe or conceive, as I run down the street with my hands up, bullets flying I think they’re hittin’ me.
My mind turns to when I was twelve years old, playing in the park with my BB gun, can’t you see the police are killing me, as me, she, and he become we, not for the right reasons, but just for the season.
The US government is trying to charge me with treason because some cops got shot. I told the gunman that’s not revolution, but only a secondary solution, but many of my people have looked past this conclusion and quote Mao, “Power comes from the barrel of a gun,” or Malcolm, “by any means necessary.” Some have gotten so radical they call on Khalid Muhammad like he is God. Muslims call on Allah, Christians to Jesus. There we are no longer we but back to being me, she and he, not for the season but all the wrong reasons.
Now my own people are charging me with treason. They turn me over to the NAACP who turn me over to the government so this holiday season, it is me who you see on the crucifix around your neck.
Like Public Enemy can, “I tell them I never had a gun.” But you watch me executed with chicken hanging out your mouth, drinking egg nog, singing merrily as I speak with a loud voice, saying Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? She and he and now we die as we for all the wrong reasons.