Black Panthers

i was prisoner in a cell

with a job sweeping up the cement floor

i felt warm inside the joint

listening to stories of a new cold war

suffering inside my own locked door

but i took my escape from white-washed walls

while running my mouth

up and down these injustice halls

into another heated Oakland night 

looking for a little daylight

across the narrow bridge

hearing stories of police oppression and bloody Pine Ridge

here were proud Black Panthers feeding kids

in the early morning hours before school

teaching each and every one the precious golden rule

they sat with spoons and forks and a dull knife

learning to avoid a world of drug-dealing and lower nightlife

where pigs in patrol cars pull up to a broken curb

smashing any black sign that says "Do not disturb!"

but kids kept reading their books

while giving me curious childhood looks

as if to ask who i might be and what was my ultimate goal

but i was running flat-out out on my imagined parole,

both fists held high and tight in my striped uniform.

i mounted the hard-to-climb ladder and stood on my own platform

calling for justice and civic reform

no one heard

i shouted each angry word

before ominously, Mister J Edgar Hoover and his criminal FBI

gagged my mouth and poked my one good eye!

i was so aggrieved and began to cry,

then a mighty pain

it seemed there was nothing more to gain

and i could have been blind

it seemed normal being left behind

when the American party was about to begin:

no one stood a fair chance to win.

there was barely an open seat to watch the beginning of the freedom show

when i saw an angry bird flying by named Jim Crow;

i watched him grab a hanging rope,

tie a clever knot.

his following gang  

hiding in my blind spot

circumstances kept changing; children took their tests:

i heard they all got passing grades 

but were treated like uninvited guests

and the FBI led me to a party wall

i entertained myself with a game of dodge ball,

dreaming of a fertile field, praying for a gentle rain,

picking at my Attica lock 

trying to remove my invisible slave chain.