All Over the Place: Reparations – Part 3 (2014-2016)

Because it never ends

By Michael H. Brownstein



Because America is not fair,
Because racism needs to stop,
Because ignorance has to end,
Because the police need to know their job,
Because we no longer can put up with bullies with guns.

All Over the Place: Reparations – Part 2

By Michael H. Brownstein











1898, election day, Wilmington, North Carolina,
the business elite include all races, all ethnicities,
lawyers and doctors, teachers and store owners,
no color boundaries, no issues with racism –
the city an integrated government duly elected –

All Over the Place: Reparations – Part 1

By Michael H. Brownstein











Outside the Mark Twain National Forest,
a cemetery, small and tidy, African-American owned,
and inside the park down a rough unmarked path,
the town that was before it wasn’t – a freeman’s space,
safe from the war racism constantly creates.

All Over the Place: 1939: Eviction Day

By Michael H. Brownstein




We planted cotton
and scarred our hands,
came home to make love
and fell asleep instead.
Greed is a wicked half-sister.