i dont know harlem
i didnt experience what it was like to be in the midst of a renaissance
i wasnt there for langton hughes or countee cullen or james weldon johnson
i dont know their world
i know their works
i know the emotion that is invoked when i read their heart scrolled against digital pages that didnt even exist when they were writing
but i dont know
harlem
i listen
as count bassie or dizzy gillespie or louis armstrong play the soundtrack for the moment
but when i close my eyes
i dont see harlem
there are no flash back
or cut away to a different time
i grew up during in a different time
when we had forgotten about our struggles
masked our pride with false success made off of drug sales
when i close my eyes i see
fatherless homes
where women are raising our boys to be just like them
i see daughters
searching for love in desolate places
i see our pride being hustled for pennies on the dollar by the same thieves that stole our soul
i dont know
harlem
our children
may never see success like rosewood or black wall street
they may believe that ballin’ is based on bullshit
where success means selling out
who in the hell gave stepin fetchit a record deal
who in the hell gave stepin fetchit a record deal
who in the hell
my children may never hear james brown yell about black pride and understand how it charged a nation living in exile
to busy believing in love taught by lil wyane
and this is not a shot a lil wayne
but damn
where is my renaissance
i dont know harlem
i know that somewhere along the way our queens became bitches then started calling themselves kings
i know that somewhere along the way our kings became dogs then started calling themselves God
i know that our soul has been sold
like slaves on auction blocks
where parts of our very culture are picked apart and mimicked
i know that our dreams
have been placed on the shoulders of ancestors that dont even recognize who we are
harlem,
i am sorry
because i really wish i knew you
