To the N.C.A.
To be caught in a song
isn't anything
like being
caught in a poem,
to be caught in a scene
is everything
unlike being
caught inside a man
who watches, who watches
the decline of men
who I move beside
but won't allow their hatred
or any of their smallness
to move within me.
Yes, I watch the decline of men
by seeing so many oversized ones
dressed in whiteness, a skin
I don't share with any of them,
a whiteness they believe is above
the colours of others, is known as
the national alliance of citizens--
what a catchy misleading lie-led name
kind of like supremacists, or neo-this
and neo-that-- so self-conscious,
self-blemished, so many selfish selves,
the little fellas with big hatreds,
who I move beside, I move away from,
I need to see, watch, little minded
caught up in some renewed worship
of whiteness, white skin, white bibles,
caught in the throats of these faux messiahs.
Such names, Donald, Jared, Andrew, Jason,
Doug, and even Stephen, tiny white
overly visionless boys now given power
by the shallow corporate pockets, endless
succession of CEOs, all holding the hats
full of ripped strips of unlined paper,
each one with the scribbled name of
each of them, who we withstand today,
names written in blue, red, black, or gray,
ink that can never be white, the succession
who I know is waiting to be picked
out of that growing hat, who I move beside
unalarmed, unafraid, of that ooze
the open cracks in our country now allow,
trying to paint us all with the loneliest colour,
imprisoned whiteness so thick & tired
of the isolated little minds, men not men
able to wave their own skins & grins
like sly egotistic stints of leadership.
Chad Norman’s most recent books are Selected & New Poems, from Mosaic Press, and Waking Up On The Wrong Side of The Sky, from Grant Block Press. A new collection, Squall: Poems In the Voice Of Mary Shelley, is due out Spring 2020 from Guernica Editions.
Lately Chad Norman has been busy organizing Truro’s Riverwords Poetry and Music Festival, on July 20th, featuring poetry guests: Annabelle Mattinson, Megan McNutt, and Afua Cooper, and musical guests: Alexis Desjardins, Cassandra Ingles, and Chris Terry. Please bring two non-perishable food items for the Colchester Food Bank. Free Admission.
See also: The Birds (with no disrespect to Alfred), a poem by Chad Norman
Halifax, June 22. Counter Demo against White Nationalist NCA
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