Tenacious baby boys

Tenacious baby boys
Clenching and unclenching their fists
A rehearsal for the fight of warriors to be
The radiance of baby boys drooling warm milk
The bedazzlement of baby boys bold in their skin
Baby boys of the tom-tom
Baby boys of the silent drums
Baby boys taking the giant steps of first walk
First word of their throats holy full of hallelujah
Boys benevolent and young playing with their snares
In Africa and on the reservation
Baby boys who shall become executioners of the young
When watching someone die is routine in black neighborhoods
Baby boys of the wounded heart without fathers
Baby boys marvelous in their redness and blackness
Fraternal sons of empire builders
Baby boys sabotage by their lost fathers
Locked in the lower-class jails of their despair.
Baby boys of the slums that raise them
And shall come to betray them by a warm gun.

poem by David E. Patton
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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