Sun Valley
yo where you from son ? i’m from the sun / son ! skin dark like the body of the night son /
ain’t got it tatted but my city in my skin son / it ain’t pretty it’s gritty keep it real son /
i’m from the burbs son / yup / the burbs son / thought you never hear a rhythm like this
one / lo-fi funk blast it out the sub-woof / got the cul-de-sac dancin’ on the asphalt / we
be jammin’ in the street where i’m from son / every First Friday when the sun goes down
the cops come out & the kids come ‘round / but we don’t give a WHAT / we just tryna live
it up / oh ! every shade of brown you can imagine / names from A to Z the Copper State /
put that flame in me / it’s in my veins / used to have shame / but now i claim / Westside
Avondale Sean Ave reign / real dry cacti / ain’t no rain / ninety degrees / make shorts
outta jeans / have a fling anytime of the year / what’s the spring ? yeah / that’s P-H-X
& every capital be eatin’ yo / we up next ! we on the rise like dawn / rock-rockin’ on /
never fall like Cybertron / i’m from the sun / son !
even though i’m not a Sun Valley native / blacks in the desert since Spainards invaded /
we keep livin’ where our ancestors didn’t / we wished the Southwest would be different /
still ignored / isolated / imprisoned / children of chocolate sharecroppers who migrated /
i’m connected to the mountains & mirages / black as the sunset side of South Mountain
it’s so hot in the city folks can’t breathe / water on street but it’s all make-believe /
get your groceries in the strip-mall by the bank / stop by Circle K get a lil drank /
& i don’t mean brown or white / you might need electrolytes cuz sunlight hurts ya brain /
some work all day & don’t get a break / dreamin’ of some green just to get away /
you cross the Rio / you might get swallowed / & if you been around then you just know /
nothin’s really poppin’ but some cuffs & bones / children & adults who call the city home /
this land is being bought by people who only visit the desert to dodge snow / yo / what if
it’s returned to those who named it first ? sonoran dirt births the most resilient souls / oh !
even though i’m not a Sun Valley native / blacks in the desert since Spainards invaded /
we keep livin’ where our ancestors didn’t / we wished the Southwest would be different /
still ignored / isolated / imprisoned / children of chocolate sharecroppers who migrated /
i’m connected to the mountains & mirages / black as the sunset side of South Mountain
Iggy Azalea Holds Hands With New “Boyfriend” Playboi Carti*
when Iggy & Carti hold hands
I hear my college friend say I’m not into white guys another Blacked video is uploaded
to Pornhub
white girls tweet my black boyfriend said I can say nigga black boyfriends respond
black girls are jealous
I’m vacuumed back to 2007
my girlfriend is from Minnesota
her acne is Confederate red which is American red
like the flag my father works for
so I don’t question her parent’s 6pm curfew
or her gossiping friends, always glancing
longways, instead I gloat, glad to be coal dark
like night skies beneath the silver moon
reveling in the chessboard of our skin a dream our locked fingers finish
Young Jeezy belts you know I keep that white girl CHRISTINA AGUILERA & my
girlfriend is indeed a genie in a bottle, a granted wish granting wishes now I’m Corey
from Boy Meets World but I have a 4d curl pattern when wet my Topanga does not have
full lips, hers are tight as her mother’s eyebrows
the morning my father & I show up at her door to confess my trespassing, how I snuck
out & ran a few miles, laid naked with her daughter both of us too afraid to have actual
intercourse not because her Dad would call me nigger but because the unknown is simply terrifying plus we have no condoms or I can’t put it on
when I see Iggy & Carti hold hands, I remember how most of the cheerleaders were
non-black or light-skin, how I admired them underneath a red gazebo
at lunch, their nails maroon, their hair auburn or strawberry or honey-maple
the desert sun tanning them different shades of bread & sandpaper, more pale than a
brown paper-bag but never as pale as my girlfriend, whose skin burned scarlet as the
sinner’s letter. I did not understand the brand we both burnished but I picked the iron
myself, once while watching TV probably, Power Rangers or something like that, where
the white girl wears pink & curls her pink ribbons two pop-stars show affection on
camera & I’m sitting on a bus in the 8th grade holding my girlfriend’s hand, before her
parents order the driver to separate us & teachers stand watch at their doors during
passing period like prison guards. I’m learning how to love running away from mirrors. A cold-sweat deadsprint. Someday I will write this poem, free enough to admit my shame & guilt.
*title adapted from the following headline “Iggy Azalea, 28, holds hands with new ‘boyfriend’ Playboi Carti, 22, at Rolling Loud Festival in Los Angeles”, from http://www.lindaikejisblog.com
Mi Amor
the raw numbers and statistics in regards to how many transgender women, and in particular working- class black transgender women are being murdered, are quite flawed as many of our sisters are misgendered within their very deaths.
~Feroz Anir
at your funeral, I read the name
of someone that I knew from high school
you were not someone I knew from high school you were the promise of Atlanta forming
in the smoke of a pearled blunt
you were fierce as the sun of Southern summers
& your name means beloved or great you were both & more, greatly beloved
from the Southside all the way west to Litchfield jheri curl-haired jackfruit of the desert
transcending the thorns of a name easy as bread rises in the oven
we wanted each other for a time
for the length of a car ride to a hiking trail
& I was supposed to see you again if even from a distance
I could not look into that casket misnamed on your deathbed
Mya Moore. Mya Moore. Mya Moore. when I say your name three times fast
it sounds like mi amor, mi amor, mi amor
& you are. I’m sorry I did not tell you sooner.
Sean Avery (he/they) is a rapper, poet & teaching artist based in Arizona. Their work integrates rap, poetry, and theater to explore how Black masculinity is projected onto their body. They strive for an authentic performance of self, in hopes that they’ll inspire others to examine their own identities. Avery has shared stages with Saul Williams, J. Ivy, and Lemon Anderson. Their work’s been featured in Afropunk, Blavity, the Chicago Hip-Hop Theater Festival, and the Tucson Poetry Festival. Currently, Avery teaches throughout
Write On, Downtown 