Am I Not Human?

As you’ll note in an earlier post, I encountered Amazon.com’s racist search engine. Well, it got me thinking. Since alerting the community; having Amazon call me and sending a follow-up email to the company’s customer service, we’ve made the tiniest progress.

Now, it seems that all a searcher has to do is request “Arab terrorist costumes” in order to get costumes which imitate traditional Arabic clothing. This is still unacceptable to me. However, at least the search no longer yields links to pictures of Barack Obama. In this one small correction, I am satisfied. But, I’m really not.


I have this taste in my mouth.
It is maybe the flavour of:

rancid fruit, pickled
lynching remains served

58 years later at a BBQ
whose kindling was made

from archival lynching postcards;
blood on an arm after scratching

a new mosquito bite; scabbed
by dust from a global Trail

of Tears to Al Shifa
bombed. I might add

pustules - poorly lanced
diplomatic ooze;

or starving bloated
aneurysms of wrong action

silently exploding. and in
my mouth - twitching pointing

rage fingers swabbing
my dna screeching

different bad different bad;
acidic adrenaline sweat

after scenting the smoke
of supremacy; the vitriolic spit

of old White women
at Palin rallies.

by most accounts
I am not human

but will give candy to
Indians, ghosts, demons and Arabs

on Halloween.

More about the "Am I Not Humans?" blogging campaign here:

Comments

Unknown said…
Thank you for supporting this monthly blogging campaign against human rights abuses that we see in places like Darfur, Tibet and Haiti. Your choice for a target this month is unique ... and the poem is very good.

Asante sana,
Villager