"Brink of a new dawn"

Why is it so hard to understand

The concept of a strong black man and woman

As god plays our heart strings like a guitar strummin’

As the sun rises in our wake

And the moon ascends in our solitude

Signifying days break

To be strong you have to have struggles

You have to overcome

You know what I’m saying?

You have to have been somewhere

Lost deep into the black of your mind

Backpacked through someone else’s world

Shackled and blind

See strength comes from way down

In the confines of souls purgatory

When you can dig your way out

And live to tell your story

That is when you can say "I have struggled"

Struggled to walk free

Freely expressing what’s on my mind

Can call

You out and not waste my dime

Inhibitions no longer hug my throat like a noose

Fear is not the decision maker

Only I will choose

You see struggle is a word we all speak too easily

You have known struggle when you’ve inherited your father’s shackles

Struggle can feel your bones ache

Struggle senses your spirit break

Standing out on a ledge

Sitting high up in the tree

Struggle knows your fight

Because he’s never been free

He can change his clothes

Or cover his face

Struggle knows defeat

Because in his mouth is a permanent taste

Of the bitterness that he holds

Like a stifling cold

How you gone tell struggle about the worlds wrongs

And expect to play a sonnet of your sad song

He has been watchin for way too long

From behind the roundness of his own eyes

Locked away in his soul’s demise

Sitting in the seat of his spirit

Not letting other’s jeer at it

Struggle is like an old song

That you think of after the days been long

And then you hear the remix and think "they know they wrong"

How he changes and is never the same

Like the face of a twin but with a different name

Breathe and watch with me, inhale struggle deep

And you can see why he never sleeps

You see I’m struggles sister

RESISTANCE

After his birth I came into existence

I know what he has endured

And you can believe I won’t be as demure

Because I know what to expect

And a rumble in my belly will cause a detonation if you choose to neglect

See I haven’t been around as long of a time

I was sittin in the backdrop of courage

Building strength of mind

I have labored X’s and Kings

I am the mother of "by any means necessary" and "freedom ring"

I’ve watched my offspring be murdered and in pain

But vengeance is not mine because it wasn’t in vain

Struggle may have been my predecessor

My next of kin

But I refuse to standby and watch him do the next generation in