For George

Lifeless he is carried; his open eyes look towards the sky.
The remnants of his tears stream, just minutes before he screamed
I can’t breathe, still the evil one pressed harder with his knee;
In his last moments he called for his mother; in distress he was, but 
Still, he could see her. Cold-blooded eyes stared with arrogance in the air;
Inside they smiled for they relish the instillation of fear.
We hang on in constant distress hoping that our salvation is near;
Strange fruit appeared on blood spattered trees for so many years;
Our brown hue our only sin— Constantly in our oppression we are set back
Then begin again; Our lives lived like a tormented novel 
Written in the bowels of hell and narrated by the devil.
Over fifty years ago, We Shall Overcome was sung,
But still now we sit anxiously with weathered hands wrung—
We survive but we have yet to thrive. Systematically we are targeted
So our solemn plight is to stay alive. They see our sorrow, 
But they ignore our cries; I swear under the heavens 
and on the pain of my grandmother’s eyes, that one day . . .
That one glorious day, we shall arise.