The Week in Oakland: Friday's Aftermath

The morning after

raises its head

Despite an urge to just slack and nurse me cold

I was out running a few errands on the town

 Eye-witness

 location

Fake blood stains,
gritty shattered glass

Someone has to clean up

Painted over graffiti 

an abstract figurative painting

of "Hands up,
Don't shoot"

Murderers

it reads

Half-mast

 for assassinated cops in Texas,

First time it has flown since 

the last demonstration

took it down

What would Ali say?

How Oakland see itself

 How it would like to be seen

 The reality

 is perhaps slightly

 more predatory

 But we even have our own 

Homeland Security patrols

 Big Capital intends

to follow San Francisco

and make this a real

machine for the wealthy

But they have to factor in

large numbers of the defiant

African-Americans

 And large numbers

of Mexican-Americans

and the jails next door

 Can we be intelligent enough to share?

 

 A quilt of all colors

equal and worthy of respect

no ghastly rich, 

no wretched poor?

No assault weapons,

no private arsenals,

no private armies

A democracy  with personal privacy 

and with a responsible

answerable

security apparatus

An up-link truck

moved in while I was out,

Just as every other night

 still in late daylight,

A lady beds down peacefully

undisturbed by the cops

as they come and go

from headquarters

8 July 2016