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The Apocalypse as seen Where the Waters Meet during the Summer Solstice.

by Timothy Prolific Edwaujonte

Water no get enemy. If water kill your child, water you gon use.  – Fela Kuti

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We dance clockwise on the mound   wind

dampening locs   curls   and wampum

dangling from limbs and leather

sage   cedar   eucalyptus   smudge

the children of wind and water

as they dance upon

the back of the great turtle

We salute the four

directions    make plain

our petition for the end

The pale ones see the tide rise

barrel toward us   laughing

They are fools   lacking

a word to synthesize  justice   equity   and empathy

They fear             the water   wind   earth   and fire

Water   wind   earth   fire

are our grandmothers

We   their children

                            dancing clockwise on the mound

                            direct our grandmothers

                                               down the inlet

                                               past the dirt roads   smoke shops   gas stations

                                               to the estates    coal plants 

                                               yacht clubs    country clubs

                                               county executive offices that let our peninsula flood

We their children

                            watch the grandmothers

                            grind concrete   marble   stained glass

                            steeples   maybachs   bikram yoga mats

                                                        into a fist soaked with flame,

                                                        fingers unfurl

and tear the feathers

out of the orange toupee

                                                        sitting on a bald scavenger

We their children

                            feel   the heat and water splash our faces

                                     the gravel and debris churn midair

                                     scratching

our bodies

This cycle dies

the water rises    aflame

                            a mound

                            of reparation

come to collect that bounced check.

We celebrate with black and milds and red solo cups of Hennessy.


Timothy Prolific Edwaujonte (formerly Veit Jones) is a poet, educator, organizer, and marketer whose creative work operates in the continuum of the Black Arts Movement, using a multi-disciplinary praxis rooted in Afro-Indigenous folklore and Hip-Hop culture. Prolific has been published in African Voices, The Inquisitive Eater, 12th Street, the graphic novel Gunplay, and YRB Magazine. Tim was a Riggio Fellow at The New School and is a graduate fellow of The Watering Hole. Edwaujonte is from Uniondale (Long Island), and lives in Bed-Stuy.

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