Badge of Blood
A poem about the hatred shown by four police officers.
Prologue
I watched the video of George Floyd’s murder to often. It seemed the media was shoving it down my throat how my fellow black man died. I watched a Minneapolis police officer choke the life from another human being. However, his eyes are what struck me as I looked at him. They were dark and blank-like a well of hate. It doesn’t surprise me how he looked. America has devalued the black body since we were 2/3rds of a person. We’ve never received our full complement of humanity. That’s why it was so easy for that monster behind a badge to kill an unarmed man on a day that represents freedom. His death on that day reveals an ugly truth- we are still not free. Its ironic many black bodies are sacrificed on the field of a battle for a day that will always be associated with the death of a fellow citizen because he was black and living in America.
The poem below is about the hatred shown to our fellow American.
Rage bubbles and stings
Your blackness I hate
It negates humanity
nothing but a bug
Squashed under oppression
Hands resting in pocket
You want to punch his ticket
Hand him to death and the afterlife
Badge sitting on chest
Shimmers with blood
Slave catcher
Nigger hater
Eyes black with evil
A well deep and dark
No feeling
No remorse
Pushing life out
Crushing a human being to the ground
I bet you hear hounds baying
Chains rattling
Like your slave holding ancestors
Relishing In his death
Staring into other eyes
Who scream stop
You killing him
Man begs for what we all hold dear
A fucking breath
I can’t breath under the weight
Dying slowly on the inside
Why?
I am George Floyd and so many others
Estacious (Charles White) is a twenty-three-year educator. He began writing over twenty-five years ago. His work experience encompasses managing schools and teaching a variety of subjects. His passions are poetry, short fiction, playwrighting, and nonfiction. He won one of six prizes in the Rockford play festival for his play “Incarcerated Christmas.” He is married with three children and a native of New Orleans.