1. |
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Left handed son where have you gone?
Have you went down to the valley of death?
Last time I saw you
your neck was red from the gallows rope
Peeled back raw like an apple’s flesh
Do you walk amongst the shadows
The light inside you dancing past your lips
playing kindling against the shades
like winters chill on hot breath
Now no longer your brothers keeper
No more than your Father’s seeker
Out of step with the world’s meter
Running between the metronome’s clicks
Dagger drawn
Face of flint
No longer the goat outside the pen
You shake the dust of the world from your heels
With each departing step
You found the human race isn’t won with honest strides
It’s fleet footed vulpes double backs
sleight of hand in sheepish guise
Because
There’s no holy glow in the television screens
no divine prophecy in the magazines
Stopped subscribing long ago to what they’re trying to sell me
Trying to soar like a seraphim rise to my feet
Cus patience breeds confidence
Wisdom brings restraint
Tie my own hands together
knowing my enemies have no stake in my fate
nowadays it’s only to martyrs that I can relate
Blood seeds of the willing planted in that concrete
You can Call it Highpower if you wish
But I just call it divine justice with no risk
We all serve a master
just a question of on which altar you sit
So get the bricks
get the mortar and
Take your pick
Joshua Miller:
Left Handed Son where have you gone?
Left Handed Son find your way back home.
Always thought myself to be a middle child of history
No beginning no ending to the cacophonic litany
The world’s vindictive rhythm dictated decisions
Ending in a deadening of my being
by the age of 16
A lack of vision made me want the pity of an early death
Newton said it best
An object at rest stays at rest
Felt for my whole life I had slept
Putting the first law to the test
Prayed for a miracle becoming
a black sheep out of step
So now I straddle cultures
Korean born American raised outside of ethnic infrastructures
Found my worth wasn’t by merit
Rather an inherent inheritance
Thanks to the One who created us from dust
Thus I stand
Forever a left handed son
Joshua Miller:
Left Handed Son where have you gone?
Left Handed Son find your way back home.
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2. |
A Ghost Key
03:51
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I stood standing in front of the bathroom mirror at the age of 7
Hoping to open my eyes wide enough to look more like the pairs of my parents’
Appearances never changed
But always tried to rearrange
Whitewash the thoughts of the guilt
of a concept I could never frame
So I tacked i up on the backwall of my closet
Pretending that I lost it amidst stockpiled piles of misplaced anger
That played the ammunition for family arguments
I took my fear and swallowed it
Rested all my hate on my tongue and cocked it
Let the frustration fester
Till it fractured my speech’s once fluid notes
Making the world feel slightly sloped
Everything backslid
Towards my self-centered core
Identity crisis was my idol
Call it Isis
I thought it gave me license
To set myself apart from the world
Instead
It stood upright
a dagger dance
a whetstone pirouette
carving out a resting place in my mind
I was just a goatskin bled dry of it’s bitter wine
A handless clock told by the dark how to keep time
This is for every child that sits behind a history book that wasn’t written for them
So they cover up their pain with artistry
The edges where the text stopped and crayon canvases begin
Framing the crossing of the Delaware and the great Sphinx
the wax bleeding into history
blotting out George Washington's features into a color wheel with no beginning and no end
For no forefathers face had ever looked like any they have ever known
I don’t think I’ve ever written more honest words than this
That to not speak of race is to kill a culture
And we as a society are internally hemorrhaging
Come let us sit at the right hand of truth and beside the left hand of spirit
A Deathless scale that portions us as an unbroken horizon against the Son
We are meant to stride frictionless
Like the bits of kaleidoscope glass we are
We are more than the sweeping commotion within our earthly sight
That covers our eyes like a stone fog
We are subtly and wind
Seized by different dusted vessels of infinite water and conducting light
How can one measure the worth of a garment when we are the threads?
We only see the edge of the loom of which we are attached
But too many see a thread of a different color as coming from a bolt of different cloth
24 years spotless of anger
19 years of wringing hands
Now I’ve set the table
We’ll have our fill before the end
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3. |
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Maranatha
Jehovah Rapha
Raah
Nissi
Shammah
I saw the sky pour scarlet lines
Like etchings on crooked palms
Outlining a pair of tattered wings wearing a tin crown
Flapping violently with the grain
It spoke nothing
Held thunderclaps in each its hands
and war beneath its hooves
Greeted eagerly by backdoors
and whispered secrets
It kept glass eyed hatred in television sets, cupboard drawers, and by street corner signs
Where people offer their safety hand over fist
While clutching each other's fingers
shaped into shadows that look like coffins
In the dusks last lantern light
I saw the bellies of women filled with flames
Stamped out by silver hooves
Before as much as a cry could escape from their lips
They cough the smoke from their flattened stomachs
Kiss with sooted lips and give charcoal filled grins
I watched plowshares bend like tired backs over bronze earth
Scattering silver sparks like seed over unyielding ground
that took the sweat from men’s brows
and drank joyfully the blood of their hands
Mapping red thread roots over the copper loam
That sprouted the muzzles of wolves with mortar mouths and pestle teeth snatching
the speech of angel tongued children;
They spoke in the language of God
And after I surveyed all that had been done
I tried to shut out my anger with a match stick mouth
But my black cauldron mind boils over with the striking sound of sulfur
Righteous indignation turns to holy ghost heaviness
that escapes like a free falling hammer from my chest
That makes me cry out
Maranatha
Jehovah Rapha
Raah
Nissi
Shammah
Oh come swiftly for this nation that burns its candle at both ends
It arrogantly believes that time runs straight
a bullwhip they control for their own benefit
Not knowing that they are merely a neighboring spoke beside destruction
on age’s wheel
Lobo eyed children
ones that carry stones in their left hand while greeting friends with their right
Lash your splintered bones in the shape of a crucifix
Make sure to listen to the sounds of the marrow scraping against marrow
Let it be a tuning fork whose pitch cracks your ribs
Let your blood flow forth
Make your heart burst like wineskins
For horsemen come
Horsemen take
No crimson mark above your door will save your kin
No forefathers face will lead to your escape
What you hear tearing through your stepping stone thrones of glass and steel
that sounds like the wind through a keyhole
Is
DEATH
undiluted
by the snake skin palms of man
These are surely the last days
The prophets fill the streets
Playing dirges for covered ears and dancing feet
Babylon falls like a millstone into the sea
But
To a lamb even a dragon must bow its knee
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4. |
half moon human
01:19
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Lay my body with the kindling in the corners of your remorse
I hope the fires heard by your itching ears over your own tongues discourse
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5. |
Left Handed Son
03:40
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The skin of my body
is the skin of a drum
Every lash across my ribs
conducts percussive song
Scarified 16 bars
A note for every flaw
Each wound
Connecting like constellations
I am Ursa Major
Den father to sons and daughters
Children unaware of their place amongst the stars
But
Great love
cannot be contained
Like wine in jars of clay
Cracked and thinning pottery
We are merely
A cup trying to contain the ocean
Overflowing and drunken from
the our contents intoxicating spirit
Gushing forth from our fissures and cracks
Our bones may lay brittle
But in death they will be stacked
Blazing funeral piers scraping against the heavens
an indication of our crowning destination
For we are made of dust and breath
Living only starts at death
For our soles were meant for steps
Our heads have no place to rest
We wave no flags
Giving allegiance to no empire
For the kingdom we serve is unseen
Underfoot
Not upon the backs of an ass or a pachyderm
Beasts of a burdened political system
When asked, who are you?
We reply I? I am not, I represent the Great I Am
We speak on behalf of the one with a voice like a trumpet call
Isa,
Living water
Bridegroom
Great shepherd
The burning bush that was not consumed
Teaching us that the greatest victories
are indicated by the scraped knees of the
servant
The ones who pad their footfalls by walking on hand and knee
Our backs will become bent in the shape of a bell curve
Gaussian functions indicting we are dictated by our hearts
And we bend north and south from there
So awake children of Zion
Understand the lamp you hold in such high esteem
only blinds you
Let us not cling to the safety of steeples
and spires
Totemism of glass
and mortar
Built to echo till the voices become one sound
That they think is our God’s speech
So do not sit with bated breath
Stock straight eyes ahead in those wooden bastilles
As a great friend once told me
*There is only death in our safety
And We serve a God that breathes
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6. |
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Cliff edge dances beside crevasse lined cracks
Hesitation lost with each soft soled advance
Toes point to heaven with angelic rhythm
A heels kiss away from countless schisms
She dances from men’s advances
Keeps her head in her book
far from the callous glances
She takes the public transit
Armed only with a thick skin against
backhanded compliments
While she fidgets
with the gold that sits on the 4th digit of her left hand
Playing with the her grandmothers old wedding band
A piss off for the men that try give her fish hook compliments
But she bends those barbs backwards
Spits that iron in their face
Her mother taught her which knuckles to put her house keys in
and when to keep a finger on the mace
A soft as lace demeanor
Wrapped around a crowbar tough character
Daughters learn the juxtaposition of their position from early age
Sons are taught the world is theirs from boyhood on their confidence is laid
I’m just one man of privilege admitting that I don’t understand much outside what I see
But if I truly love my sisters and daughters then I have to believe in their belief that the world
might be less fair than what’s been done to me
My girlfriend told me about how men speak to her on the street
I told her take their words as a complement, brush them off with ease
She explained to me that the words are more about a role and less about the sting
Kind of like admitting that I have don’t have clue is more about pride and less about the certainty things
But I don't know
Libby Johnson:
You speak over me
But you don't speak lightly
Your words could make me what I am to be
Raise the banner high
Let Truth decide
Who He declares I am to be
Kyla Morgan:
And she wanders
Wandering the paths of exploding stars and glass
Glistening, gliding
Dying to know where she's at
Where she belongs
This song never go it right
Words too small to capture his heart
She starts to listen
Believing she is just a collection of mismatched parts for the taking
Replacing matchbox cards or toy trains for these grown up hands to play
And she stays because this is her place
A cacophony of sounds where only boyhood fantasies may abound
And she is found breaking
Open and exposed
Marred by jagged scars
That make a road map to the lost pieces of her heart
This is the heart of a broken china doll dream
The once believed enough to dance and sing
Until she learned what doll really means
But darling you are the daughter of a king
Defined by strength and beauty
It's you He sees
And needs
And calls
Reminding you it's all for the taking
Don't lose sight of the stars
Because they are a reflection of His affections
Fluttering then bursting with passions
He's asking you to see
That you are worth more than the skies or sea
For He gives you life that you may share it
This is our anthem
A thousand couldn't stand in the light of the might of a woman who understands that she is more than a queen
She is a Son
The image of God's good love
So trust that she will burn
Radiate to penetrate the night and stand tall in His presence
Able to dance her dreams without a gleam of question
Because this was what she was made to be
Complete
So raise the banners high and see
Libby Johnson:
You speak over me
But you don't speak lightly
Your words could make me what I am to be
Raise the banner high
Let Truth decide
Who He declares I am to be
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7. |
Shake
04:54
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I was born a canvas covered picture frame
My teachers sanded down my edges
Not knowing that it would mean I could never be cornered
So the paint always spilled off my sides
Making sporadic sputtering acrylic spit stains when I opened my mouth for speech
I never knew to protect my heart so I let my colors bleed
So
Most of my childhood was spent playing near cemeteries
And trying my best to avoid talking with strangers
My pockets filled with quarters and always in hopes of buying my friends thoughts
and
My teenage years were consumed by death metal records in my friends car
and getting punched by men 5 years older than me in garages filled with kids that wore shirts that didn’t fit correctly,
learning how verses not only get written on a page but also become etched on your heart
but
I’m older now
I planted a flower bed in my chest
and waited for the rain
But it beat hard enough to wash the gullies out
So the soil ran down my legs
My bare feet darkened and stained
the roots lay bare inside my chest
a fire napping inside my conscious
Laughing softly as each drop of rain kissed its red flecked skin
My calloused vellum hands lay in wait unwritten by my sides
My eyes stand perched like peering vultures from the caverns of my mind
Because
I’ve been whittling guilt from black cloud promises
and trying my best to hammer out silver linings
With caution tipped fists, swollen blue reminders of what happens
when hesitation rears its head and fear wins
I'm tired of
demons waking me weekly before my alarm rings
I have enough ghost hunts I need to learn to stop chasing while laying in a borrowed bed
So
I put on a brave face that I chiseled with shaky hands because
I’ve taken a lot of disappointment lately and
I’m finding truth in the weight of friends hands on my shoulders
When the arch of my back bridges sorrow and joy with each shallow breath I take
My heart cries anarchy because I’ve seen greed trap young women in
windowed cages wearing less for men that will pay more when the curtains close
I only imagined their pain as I biked by them everyday on my way to work
But I still can’t help thinking that it’s all my fault
Why didn't I smash the windows, set the captives free
Why didn't I do what had been done for me?
The canals where the girls worked were filled with swans that floated among the garbage
And the neon signs of sex shows made the birds look like phosphor winged demons or broken angels
But the crowds of men looking for a hour glass figure to hide their loneliness and the women clutching cameras and overstuffed purses barely noticed them
While my friend Jimmy froze on the streets at night
laying by the bike paths like broken teeth too fractured to be set back in their rightful place
They walked by deaf while Mary plucked the violin strings I gave her in November, her whispered words nodding in agreement
to the wolves that sat in her head content in feasting on her heart
And these things make me no longer afraid travel roads without markers or to take walks after dark
because I see now
that the eyes are the color spectrum of the soul
and so many people have pupils that are shades of gray,
the colors never change no matter how colorful their speech
Which has made me learn to
fashion my words as ropes and set my thoughts firm like boards
To build bridges between cynicism and desires for scarred hearts
I wish my hands were set as hot brands lined with the stories of the weaker than
That they would lick hungrily for unwitting palms to declare that they have value
So every handshake would mean something
I just want this all to mean something
because my throat grows tired
Of coughing with sawdust lungs which makes my chest rattle lonely song
with sinew heartstrings fickle notes
lifting my voice octaves higher than it was suppose to go
And it all just keeps getting caught in my throat
But my Father keeps promising an easy yoke
I have to remind myself that it’s good, that it’s grace
He’ll let me bend but never break
I keep pouring myself out like a cistern
Until my bottom is scraped
I keep waiting to be filled.............
And I keep waiting to be filled.
But silence never fills the cracks
and I cannot find what I've always lacked
So I stand knocking on my God’s door
I know, I know He’ll answer.
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8. |
shame
02:40
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I don’t know much about fairness but I’m familiar with justice
and how my tongue twists it into a shape the looks an awful lot like vengeance
I just grit my teeth and pray that grace transcends this hard as iron ire filled temperament
I pray that God plays the anvil that stretches my will into a plowshare instead of the sharpened tip where my temper sits
But regardless of sincerity I always spit out that bridle and bit
Even though the pull from an unseen Masters reigns is to save my steps from the pit
I cloaked myself in fury and shod my steps with purpose
Apathy was my blindfold written inside was the word “worthless”
Thoughts of injustice kept me up at night
But not near as much as my self-righteous soul would like
It’s been 5 years spent picking the lint out of my pockets
Counting monetary gain as loss
It’s been a tacticle struggle to stop from feeling the cost
Of becoming a rolling stone without moss
A slow dance with integrity
A game of crossed fingers theology
Became a tightrope walk of art
and self-serving apologies
Seven is the number of completion
I prayed that seven wouldn’t complete its task in me
Seven sat silently in the corners of my remorse
Discourse brought no course of action for divorce
From Cardinal sins that blinded cardinal directions
given by the ghost that lives in me
My hands knew nothing of what my eyes did
And my feet kept secrets from my mind
So each of my limbs held errors
Which led me to err on the side of caution
But I’m
No longer letting my condition dictate my position
No longer singing and “I was wrong” swan song
Psalmic inspiration without self-minded trepidation
Has helped me to define freedom
I know now that grace is a steam engine
and compassion is a well that won’t go dry
Just like love is a flame that can’t go out
So when God stokes the fire in my chest my limbs act as pistons
I have no choice but to let the steam that rises escape from my mouth
Which makes my body a fractured locomotive beating a rhythm of submission
I’m all forward motion, free fall, and breaking boughs
Hoping to stick my landing somewhere between eternity and kept vows
Which has stopped me from killing myself for over 5 years now
This is for
the ones that have to bench press their blankets every morning to get out of bed
Because the world seems too heavy even from a bedroom window
It’s for the ones who wear X’s on their hands as a reminder of their parent’s mistakes
I pray I can be the salt that mixes with the blood-stained soil and not the added pain in someones gaping reminder
Before I’m plunged back into the ocean I was meant for all along
To become just another note in an entire symphony
Because a note alone just conveys a tone
And most everyone I know is not in harmony
I try to be a man, I plant my feet, I stand like a native son,
I’m trying to make my childish nature forgotten and foregone
I’m no longer content with playing with sticks in the front lawn
(in the light the dark has no place to hide)
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Keyoung Columbus, Ohio
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