Nuyorican Poets Cafe, 3rd Street Atlantis
East of the Sun
West of the moon
At the New York rock where the clock never stops between
avant gardes and hip hop
On the block where once “Slugs” wuz
Lee Morgan died, inside
gun shots like sidewinders
Where we be- Avenue C
Where the great Sun Ra played
Evening to morning
Intergalactic jazz blue/ness
Where wives were discovered and discarded
among empty bottles of Remy Martin
and plugs of black gum opium
where the stairwells and rooftops
once flowered with syringes and
bloody cotton and burnt bottle caps
the cooker as icon and emblem of our
demise and our distraction
peace gods
the nuyoricans live
the blacks live
the poor ass white boys live
the nuyorican poets cafe lives and
sprouts from mama’s rice and beans
collard greens, work torn knees,
a harvest of pink, yellow, tan, brown
and black titans-thousand headed
griots of the bacalao and black
bean nation, azucar, rice and
cotton nation stoop labor day labor, factory work nation.
welfare, workfare
no carfare nation
no fresh air, no ‘good’ hair
much despair nation
platanos all
negros all
without reference to who
used to own us.
defiant in our ignorant wisdoms
and sorrowful pleasures
now is now then is then
the young are rising -like phoenix, like Osirus, like Jesus
as oracles of change
as Babaloas of the new/old
machete dreams of freedom
peace and venceremos
my people.

by Joseph R. Ubiles 4/5/03 11:54 AM
University Heights H.S.