“How are you afraid of a man
  running away from you?”
                                     -Toni Morrison

Fear is a magnetizer.
It changes the polarity of black bodies.
Makes them highly attractive to
bullets, police batons, tasers,
white rage, white guilt,
and blue-eyed blondes.

Fear is a multiplier.
It turns children into men,
men and women into monsters,
and non-compliant teens
into dangerous gangs
and threatening mobs.

Fear is a magician.
It turns Hip Hop into gangster rap,
plastic toys into guns,
cigarillos, cellphones,
wallets, brazenness,
and extended index fingers
into high caliber weapons.

Fear is a revisionist history class.
It turns people of color into the
enslavers, confederate soldiers,
lynch mobs, klansmen, night riders
and terrorists.

Fear is a sniper.
It takes dead aim, aims to kill,
kills for sport and pleasure,
is pleased to take souvenirs,
and stuffs and mounts its trophies.

Biography:

Frank X Walker is the author of seven collections of poetry, including About Flight (Accents, 2015). Former Poet Laureate of Kentucky, he is the founder of Affrilachian Poets and a professor in the English Department and African American and Africana Studies at the University of Kentucky.

This is part 5 in the series Fallen at Charleston, guest-edited by Brenda Marie Osbey.

Fallen at Charleston
Contents:

“How We Could Have Lived or Died This Way” by Martín Espada

“Notes on the State of Virginia, III” by Safiya Sinclair

“What a Fellowship” by Afaa Michael Weaver

“Black 101” by Frank X Walker

“Black Bird” by Terrance Hayes

“Live Oak” and “Riposte XIV” by Shauna Morgan Kirlew

“Fallen at Charleston” Introduction by Brenda Marie Osbey