Hip Hop Conscious Rap Must be a critical component of the BAM 27 City Tour

Bay Area hip hop organizers, promoters and producers share a joyful moment with Marvin X, godfather of conscious hip hop, at the Berkeley Black Repertory Theatre. Marvin has agreed to work with the conscious hip hop community to revolutionize hip hop poetry and pass the baton to the next generation of artistic freedom fighters!

Stay tuned for battlerap#4

"When you listen to Tupac Shakur, E-40, Too Short, Master P or any other rappers out of the Bay Area of Cali, think of Marvin X. He laid the foundation and gave us the language to express black male urban experiences in a lyrical way!"--James G. Spady, Philadelphia New Observer

As we move toward implementing the Black Arts Movement 27 City Tour suggested by Ancestor Amiri Baraka and being organized by BAM co-founder Marvin X, it is crystal clear we are passing the baton to the next generation of North American African artistic and cultural workers, or in the words of Ancestor Paul Robeson, "Artistic freedom fighters!" The Black Arts Movement and the Black Liberation Movement are indivisible, inseparable, thus unconquerable, a mighty fist in the face of oppression by global and American white supremacy, which are one!




Fidel Castro has told us, "The weapon of today is not guns but consciousness!" The mission of the BAM 27 City Tour is to spread consciousness throughout this land and beyond, to revolutionize North American African youth culture, transcending the toxicity of reactionary rap promoted by the white supremacy propaganda machine to destroy the minds, hearts and souls of North American Africans and all those youth around the world who identify with our art and culture, which is the vanguard of global youth culture. If North American African youth fart, global youth culture farts! If we shit, global youth culture has a bowel movement!

As elders, our job is to infuse the present generation of North American African youth artists and cultural workers with the necessary knowledge to rekindle the flame of revolution and radical art and culture, so they will not settle for the reactionary, toxic art and culture promoted by the white supremacy propaganda machine vie record companies, promoters and agents of their industry of menticide.

Thus, the BAM 27 City Tour will include a critical component of conscious hip hop artists, educators and cultural workers, qualified to spread the message that revolution is, in the words of Ancestor John Henrik Clarke, not a sprint but a long distance run.


Eldridge Cleaver and the US delegation in North Vietnam, meeting with General Giap who defeated the US in Vietnam.


Most importantly, we must advance the notion that we are all leaders, we are all the central command, as the socalled Viet Cong announced when the Americans said they were going into Cambodia to destroy the Viet Cong central command. For every youth the American death machine destroys, maims, paralyzes, traumatizes, neutralizes, punkanizes, imprisonizes, druganizes, we shall present a new leadership of cold, sober youth to continue our liberation movement until victory!

--Marvin X
6/3/17

 BAM co-founders Ancestor Amiri Baraka and Elder Marvin X

 BAM co-founders Askia Toure' and Marvin X

 The West Oakland Crew at Lil' Bobby Hutton Park, West Oakland

 Angela Davis, Marvin X and Sonia Sanchez

 Harlem, NY reception for Marvin X at the home of Rashida Ismaili

 Mrs. Amina Baraka

Amiri Baraka and Maya Angelou dancing their way to Black Arts Movement Heaven!

 
 Marvin X, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, and poet Prosperity Carter. Mayor Schaaf said she will use her influence with US Mayors to promote the BAM 27 City Tour.

 Panel on Black Arts Movement and Women at Laney College

 Marvin X and Nefertiti, oldest daughter who demanded her dad pass the baton.

 Amina and Amiri Baraka. We think the babe in Amina's arms is Ras Baraka, now Mayor of Newark, New Jersey.

 BAM Poets Choir and Arkestra at the University of California, Merced, BAM 50th Anniversary Conference.

 Bruce George of Def Poetry Jam, the next generation of BAM

 Master Teacher Marvin X and his student, multi-talented poet, writer Prosperity Carter

 Dr. Cornel West supports the BAM 27 City Tour. 

Marvin X and Fred Hampton, Jr. Black Panther Cub, who was in his mother's womb when the Chicago police assassinated his father in bed with his pregnant mother.

Phavia Kujichagulia, proud mother of daugthter, Taiwo. "Yes, I brainwashed my daughter to cleanse her mind of all white supremacy bullshit!"

Marvin X trying to save the babies as Marvin Gaye sang about. 

Part One: Games Nigguhs Play

Games Nigguhs Play


Parents of Marvin X, Owendell and Marian Murrill Jackmon; he was 40, she was 20 when they married.

Mama told me to leave nigguhs alone, you don't need them nigguhs Marvin, them nigguhs need you. They just using you  Marvin. Don't let them use you, use the mind God gave you, Boy! And Daddy said, "Boy, you so smart you outsmarted yourself! You should be a billionaire, but you fucked up. I told you, whatever you wanna be, be the best. You was a dope fiend, but you wasn't even a good dope fiend. If you gonna be a dope fiend, be the best dope fiend in the world. You let that shit control you, you didn't control it. I never let nothing control me! (Dad was lying here because he had a gambling habit that controlled him. And Mama, she was addicted to nigguhs too, she helped nigguhs until her dying days, and the worst nigguhs were her own ungrateful bastard children, Marvin X included, even though he was her Star child, and all his siblings knew it except him! He had no idea how much his mother loved him and respected him and knew he was going to do great things in the world. But his siblings knew, especially his sister Donna, the greatest storyteller in the family. Her "lies" would put Marvin X to shame!


She  told her boss, "Sir, I can't come into work today because my brother is in his private plane flying to Seattle and we have lost track of him somewhere around Lake Tahoe." RIP Big D!

Poor son, his Mom knew far more about him than he would ever know about himself. She told him he didn't need a wife: according to her, he needed a maid, secretary and Mistress, but not a wife. As a man, she would never consider him for a husband. She saw her son was lost in his imagination and sexuality, especially when he lived on her 2 and 1/2 acre property that included three houses, including a studio apartment where he came to write when taking refuge from the wicked city, and from which he would go into the big house to cry on his mother's knees after abusing his wives. She told him he would never have any good luck as long as he abused women, especially the mother's of his children.

She told him, "Son, please don't have those women hollering and screaming in the night because I can hear them! Tell them to not make all that noise."

Mama wondered why her son came home from being with a woman for several days, and came into her house starving to death. He told her, "Mama, we just didn't eat, Mama, we just made love!"
Mama just shook her head. After all, her son may have gotten his passion from her. She had nine children and raised them as a single mother, and raised two grandchildren as her own. They thought she was their mother and my six sisters were their sisters.

We grew up in the projects of West Fresno until Mom became a successful real estate broker, the first black woman real estate broker in town. During the 40s, she and my father had a successful real estate business, plus they published a Black Newspaper, The Fresno Voice, until my father violated his fiduciary relationship by gambling with the people's money and lost his real estate license, and this when my parents moved to Oakland and became florists on 7th Street in Harlem of the West. But mom and dad separated and she returned to Fresno to open up her real estate business on her own.

Most Blacks, old and young, will tell you they bought their first house from my parents, especially after the war when we suffered redlining and my parents were able to help them acquire housing.

Mom and Dad were Race Man and Woman, i.e., conscious and dedicated to our people. Dad told me he saw Marcus Garvey in Los Angeles. I am sure he was addicted to the Garvey movement, especially after my childhood friend Paul Cobb told me my dad was in meetings with his grandfather and father who were Garveyites in West Oakland. Paul says he is a Garveyite and I am too! Africa for the Africans, those and home and those abroad! One God, One Aim, One Destiny!


The "People" have requested Marvin X write and perform a play about Marcus Garvey.

 In New York, actor Ganno Grills performed the role of Marvin X in Salaam, Huey Newton, Salaam. Amiri Baraka's play The Toilet  was part of the New Federal Theatre's production by Woody King.

 Nefertiti, Marvin's oldest daughter, demanded dad pass the baton to her. She is now the Executive Director of Six Square, the Austin, Texas Black Arts and Cultural District, also Associate Publisher of her dad's newspaper, The Movement, Voice of the Black Arts Movement International.

 Marvin X in a poetic moment with Oakland's Mayor Libby Schaaf

Professor Marvin X with students at the University of California, Merced, Professor Kim Macmillan's class on theatre. Students invited him to hear them read his play Flowers for the Trashman, a classic of the Black Arts Movement.

Transcending the left/right paradigm

Hal Lindsey, Born Again prophet

Eldridge Cleaver transcended the left/right paradigm. He experienced every ideology on the spectrum. Marvin X traveled with him.  It was an educational experience for Marvin X. See his book Beyond Religion, toward Spirituality and his memoir of Eldridge Cleaver My Friend the Devil. And most especially his drama One Day in the Life, including the scene of his last meeting with Huey P. Newton in a West Oakland Crack House.

 Debbie and Pat Boone

 Charles Colson said the prisons would produce Muslim terrorists. I wonder why? Amiri Baraka said, "In the end, the Negro will be the terrorist!"

 On the right, Rev. Robert Schuller at his Crystal Cathedral. Marvin X went there with Eldridge twice.

 

Jim and Tammy Baker. Eldridge gave his testimony twice at their PTL Club in Charlotte, North Carolin, accompanied by Marvin X. Marvin was shocked when a white chauffeur picked them up at the airport. He was shocked again when he saw the Christian women in long dresses and the men hugged him on both cheeks in Muslim style. 

 Marvin X says, you never know how people are until you live with them. I experienced the love between Eldridge and Kathleen from the beginning of their relationship, and later when we all lived together with their children in Atherton. Their children asked Eldridge, "If you a Christian, why you beat Mama?"

Eldridge and Marvin outside the house where Eldridge and Lil' Bobby Hutton had their shoot out with the Oakland Police. Bobby was murdered in cold blood.

photo Muhammad Kareem

Maestro Marvin X at Laney College Theatre (his former classroom, 1981), reading from his play One Day in the life, his scene of his last meeting with Huey Newton, co-founder of the Black Panther Party, in a West Oakland Crack House.

Life is not about the left and right on the political spectrum, life is about right and wrong, i.e., one can be right but wrong and left but wrong. Sun Ra said, "Marvin you so right, you wrong!" I will say, "You so left you wrong!" Supposedly, politics is about power to the people, yet we often become so dogmatic in our ideological leanings, we say to hell with people power, we must stand our ground in our strident political stance, even to the point of ignoring the suffering of our people.

Yes, there are North American Africans so loyal to the Democratic party that they will ignore our misery to maintain their membership in the Democratic party. I am horrified when I see our people living in tent cities throughout the Bay Area, especially here in Oakland, yet Democratic necros will do nothing to assuage their wretched condition, especially if relief must come from reaching out to the Republican administration to demand low-income housing funds.

We were recently invited to meet with Dr. Ben Carson, Secretary of Housing and Urban Affairs, but the Democratic necros refused to even consider meeting with him to maintain their loyalty to their Democratic massas. The Christian necro ministers declined to seek low income housing funds from the Trump Administration even though gentrification is depleting their congregations.  As their members make their way to tent cities and migrate to central valley towns from Sacramento to Fresno and beyond, apparently the necro ministers sermonize that Jesus will find a way!

We have learned Wall Street investors now own 40% of single housing units in Oakland, another reason for Oakland's rapidly depleting available units, especially after the investors made mass purchases during the subprime loan scams that tricked North American Africans and many other Americans of their basic wealth.

We heard a lecture by Van Jones who bemoaned that Oakland used to be a majority Black city but has become the bedroom of Silicon Valley. He joked that Oakland should build a wall to keep Silicon Valley out!

In the midst of gentrification, the idea of a Black Arts Movement Business District is becoming a joke, not to mention a Black cultural district for deep East Oakland. Where are we going to be, in museums along the route, with guided tours of Where We Used to Be? And this is true for Berkeley and most certainly for San Francisco.

The Fillmore has been long gone and Hunters Point is on the way. Shall we mention our beloved Harlem with whites walking around like they own the place--alas, they do! Brooklyn is not escaping the ethnic cleansing of America's cities. Some necros are happy that gentrification is upgrading their neighborhoods from the wretchedness of rats, roaches, drugs and endless crime in the street. Of course they are not concerned about crime in the suites!

Where are those necro leaders, those sycophants of the Democratic party, many of whom were on the Redevelopment boards that began necro removal decades ago. At least former San Francisco Mayor Joe Alioto publically apologized for destroying the cultural and economic vitality of the Fillmore. We've heard no apology from the necro removal necros.

Of course nobody wants to hear Trump claim we are victims of the Democratic party. Supposedly, North American Africans should join the reactionary parade for his downfall and champion the second resurrection of the Clinton crime family, even though we think Trump won fair and square, after all, he appealed to the long suffering white nationalist sentiments in Euro-Americans. Being a black nationalist, I have no fear of white nationalists. I don't give a damn if they fly the Confederate flag, I want to see us fly the Red, Black and Green.

I must say I've had experience with the white left and right, especially after assisting my controversial friend Eldridge Cleaver when he returned from exile as a right winger because he told me the left wing sent an emissary to Paris with the message he was not wanted back in America because of the hell he caused in the left. He was told to learn French and of course Cleaver would have none of this, he wanted to come home by any means necessary. He concocted a fantastic story of seeing Jesus in the moon and sold it to the right wing Born Again Christians.

Traveling with him was a great learning experience for me, allowing me great insight of white, conservative Christian America. I can say with surety, I know the white Christian mentality. I know how they feel about Black Christian preachers and believers. If Black preachers didn't graduate from Fuller Theological Seminary or a reasonable facsimile, they were not respected. About they found Jesus one Tuesday night, didn't wash, at least not until at a white Born Again dinner after Cleaver gave his testimony, they turned to me with the question, "Marvin, when did you find the Lord?" Being an actor from the Black Arts Theatre, I quickly replied, "One Tuesday night!" The dinner guests were satisfied and turned to other matters.

As Cleaver's chief aide, my first assignment was to fire all the Jews controlling him, e.g., his booking agent, publicist, secretary, etc. Of course, in doing so I discovered the tight knit Jewish family from coast to coast. As soon as I fired a Jew in San Francisco, the news hit New York the next second.

More importantly, I learned the Christians blamed the Jews for killing Jesus but feigned deep love for Israel, yet they hated the Jews for getting their savior assassinated or crucified. They would give up their pseudo love for Israel in a heartbeat or let's say for a barrel of oil!

The word went out that the Black Muslims had taken over Cleaver's ministry although the white Christians were still in control. Traveling as Cleaver's secretary, driver, bodyguard, photographer and ultimately organizer of his ministry The Eldridge Cleaver Crusades, I did indeed hire Black Muslims to assist him since Christian Blacks were mortally afraid that white man was going to kill him for lying about seeing Jesus in the moon on his balcony one night in Southern France.

He fronted me and my Muslim recruits off as his heathen converts and this cooled out the Christians since they were bankrolling his ministry. I met or was in communication with all the Born Again superstars: Charles Colson of Watergate fame or infamy, Pat and Debbie Boone, Jim and Tammy Baker, Jerry Falwell, Hal Lindsey, Billy Graham, Rev. Robert Schuller at his Hour of Power, et al.

I wouldn't close my eyes praying with these devils! One reason Cleaver hired me was to stop the white Christians from robbing him. After giving his testimony on Jerry Falwell's Old Time Gospel Hour in Lynchburg, VA, they claimed $37,000.00 in donations were received but they wanted Cleaver to give them the power of attorney so they could cash the checks, thus depriving Cleaver of addresses so he could appeal to those who donated and thus begin to establish his own ministry which was his desire after he realized they had their agenda for him which was not his agenda. We had to send a man to Lynchburg to get the money.

Now the white Christians didn't know what to do with me. Although he was twice my size at the time, they wanted to know if I was his bodyguard. I claimed I was his assistant and photographer, which I was, although he pimped my brain on many matters. When he asked me to be his photographer, I told him I wanted the Rolls Royce of cameras, Leicaflex, and he immediately went to a camera shop and bought what I wanted. But when the white Christians saw me with the Leicaflex, they became so jealous and envious I put masking tape over the name!

Now I was his bodyguard too: he gave me a 45 automatic pistol I carried in my camera bag. The Christians didn't trust him, nor did he trust them. Leaving Canada, the USA authorities searched us, then again when we arrived at Seattle airport, and again when we arrived in San Francisco. Truth is that Cleaver probably had more guns as a Born Again Christian than when he was a Black Panther. The USA didn't  know if he was still a Communist and didn't want to take any chances. They usually had a white Christian accompany us as he toured the Born Again circuit. Cleaver began to be disillusioned when he saw they had more secret meetings than Communists, especially when he was the subject!

My assignment became to establish his independent ministry, which I began to do. I had long wanted him to give his testimony at Black churches but he refused. We worked seven days a week, sometimes never seeing Black people.

When he demanded I live with the family so we could communicate better, I moved with them to Atherton, a rich white suburb near Stanford University. His wife Kathleen said to me, "Marvin, the girls used to call for you, but they don't call anymore!" No woman wants a man working seven days a week. I didn't have time to cash my check or get my clothes out the cleaners. Cleaver was a hard working Virgo and I was a Gemini with moon in Virgo, plus the son of a workaholic mother who never took a vacation in her life, while raising nine children and two grandchildren by herself as a real estate broker and lay disciple of Mary Baker Eddy's Christian Science.

I pressed him to give his testimony at a Black church. Finally, after much persistence from Bishop  Ernestine Reems of Oakland, I got him to give his "moon shot" or "Golden Shower" at her church in East Oakland. When we arrived for a preview of her venue, she immediately showed us the ceiling with gunshots from the previous occupants, the Nation of Islam, who departed in disgust after failure to pay rent.

His sojourn in the Black churches were not a happy affair. There is simply no comparison of the Black and White Church. In 1976, the Black churches were

no match for the opulent White churches, like the Jim and Tammy Baker plantation in Charlotte, North Carolina, or Rev. Schuller's Crystal Cathedral. It was like going from the massa's house to the slave hut! In the hut, they worked Cleaver from can't see to can't see, then when I went to count the money with the preacher, it was funny money. The slave hut had no air conditioning. On one occasion in a gym in Chico, CA., Cleaver almost fainted because of the heat.

After seven months, I departed from Cleaver and his Christian ministry. Again, it was an educational experience no college or seminary could have taught me. And I knew well conservative Christian America's thinking. Their white supremacy mentality has made them sick and us as well, unless, of course, we understand Rev. Cone's narrative of the Cross and the Lynching Tree!

Firstly, we should have no fear of the White Christian, right wing nationalists. We should engage them for mutual benefit, as Van Jones said recently. We endured the Crack epidemic, now they need us to help them recover from their addiction to opiates, religion included. As Rev. Cone taught us, "They can never understand Christianity until they come to terms with the cross and the lynching tree!"

We can meet with them for mutual good. Neither political party, Democratic or Republican gives a damn about the National Agenda of North Americans, be sure about this and don't drink the Kool Aide of either party. No matter whose in power, stick to our agenda, our national aspirations, and don't be moved!

I appreciate Van Jones for his conversations with Newt Gingrich, a genius of the right. Either we talk with our enemies or we kill them or they kill us. Ralph Nader has a book on the need to transcend the left/right paradigm. I have not read it, but I get the gist!

The best thing I've heard President Trump say is to use common sense. Only thing, Dr. Julia Hare said, "Common sense is not too common these days!" At least Donald Trump is a businessman with whom we might be able to do business. Yes, let's make a deal! My Mother was a business woman. When a girlfriend came by my house on the way to high school and wanted to used my mother's phone, Mama asked her if it was a business call because Mom was a business woman and my girl couldn't use the phone if her call wasn't about business. In the spirit of my mother, if it ain't bout business, get off the goddamn phone talkin' bout where you at? It's not about are you left or right, rather, are you on the side of truth, righteousness, freedom, justice and equality!
--Marvin X
5/31/17

phavia kujichagulia speaks on the psycho-linguistic crisis and the black arts movement

phavia kujichagulia, senior writer, the movement newspaper www.bambd.org

We've been white-washed, white-balled, white-listed, and white-mailed for so long we think of ourselves as the white sheep of the family. We can't wait to give our oppressors all of our time, thoughts, as well as our earnings and would never think of supporting/financing our cultural legacy and destiny. Worst of all, the popular entertainers who condemn us to racist sambo/pimp/wimp/ho stereotypes get rich doing so while real artists and edutainers working for cultural liberation,social justice, and spiritual freedom from racism, white supremacy, sexism, capitalism, etc. go underappreciated, underpaid (if ever), and underestimated. Mainstream society knows our real power. So it keeps us under control or hidden from the masses unless we buy into their racist, sexist, materialistic, white-insecurity pop bullshit.


For example, during the MC Hammer hay days, I was approached by a major record label. I was offered a recording contract if I did the following:

• Change my name to something ridiculously "ludicrous/racist/sexist/ignorant/canine-like" 
• Press/perm/straighten my hair
• Dye/DIE my hair from black to blonde 
• Bleach my skin
• Show some T&A (tits and ass)

Needless to say, I said NO to all of the above. So the music industry finally gave me one last option - ultimatum:

"Okay, this is the dealbreaker. All you have to do is say the words "bitch, nigger, motherfucker" at least once in every recording." 

I refused. They replied, "Don't you know you could be rich and famous tomorrow if you just say these three simple words just once per album?"

Thus, to this day I remain economically-challenged and few human beings have ever heard of me. Meanwhile a plethora of superficial, shallow, materialistic, self-hating, stupid rappers make bank degrading our culture by promoting white supremacy/insecurity, sexism, and capitalism.

Yes, we need to liberate our minds of euro-centric terrorism, linguistic defamation, and capitalistic insanity ASAP! 

If truth and justice were quantified we'd be super rich!

Forward Ever!

marvin x: the black panther file

"marvin x was my teacher. many of our comrades came through his black arts theatre: bobby seale, eldridge cleaver, emory douglas, samuel napier."

--dr. huey p. newton, co-founder bpp

angela davis, marvin x and sonia sanchez

stanley nelson, director of the film, black panthers: vanguard of revolution, marvin x and fred hamption, jr,, son of chicago black panther leader, assassinated by chicago police.

amiri baraka, bobby seale, ayodele nzinga, ahi baraka, marvin x

elaine brown, former chair of the bpp, halifu osumare, judy juanita, former editor of the bpp newspaper, portia anderson, phavia kujichagulia, aries jordan, marvin x

cover art by emory douglas, bpp minister of culture

bobby seale, bpp co-founder and marvin

marvin x, emory douglas, donald lacey, att. john burris

dr. wade nobles, elaine brown, marvin

marvin x and tarika lewis, first female member of the bpp

eldridge cleaver, former minister of information bpp and marvin

marvin, grandson jahmeel, director stanley nelson, att. amira jackmon, daughter naeema

marvin and fred hampton,jr.

Friday, March 27, 2009

Part Nine: My Friend the Devil

Marvin X

The next time I see Cleaver is in Mount Morris Park, renamed Marcus Garvey Park, in Harlem. I was now a resident of Harlem, or at least a worker in Harlem, while living in the Bronx with playwright Ed Bullins, after slipping into Harlem from Chicago after the assassination of MLK, Jr. Yes, I came up out of the subway at eight avenue, that subway made so famous by Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn in their tune Take The A Train. I came up into a sweltering Harlem summer of heat, sweat and funk, a love funk so beautiful that I never imagined such a happening after seeing so many beautiful black people--Chicago was great and there is nothing like Chicago, especially the South side, but Harlem, the capital of Black America, the ground that Malcolm X walked upon, and Duke, Billie, Bassie, Parker, Apollo Theatre, awesome power of my people, the East coast version of what I'd experienced in Oakland on Seventh Street, Harlem of the West. Seventh Street was a small version of what was before my eyes, a sea, a wonderland of Black people from over the world, Africa. Nigeria, Lagos,Ghana, Senegal, South Africa, Malawi, Kenya, the Caribbean, Jamaica, Trinidad, Barbados, all there swimming in blackness.

And I among them now, a negro from Cali swimming in the sea of my people, loving every moment, under the guidance of Askia Toure, my elder and teacher, telling me about the Crisis of the Negro Intellectual, telling me more about the Sufi teaching of Hazrat Inayat Khan, Rumi, Ghazali and others, about the MuKhadimah of Ibn Khaldun and other Sufi and Islamic masters. And then there was Sun Ra, the master of all masters, my teacher, mentor, friend and guide, who taught me all that one ever needed to know about theatre, the master teacher of BAM, who told us about traveling the space ways, and Milford Graves, master drummer who was so powerful he was banned from downtown, too aggressive, too arrogant, too too too, Milford, my main man, and the Last Poets coming together to take us to the next level into Rap, Abiodun, Ben Hasan, Gylen Kayne, David and Filipe, Barbara Ann Teer and the New Lafayette Theatre, Ed Bullins and Robert Macbeth and crew,the Yoruba king, Baba Serjiman, who moved to Sheldon, South Carolina, Olatunji, master drummer of Nigeria, all there in the Harlem madness and joy, Amiri Baraka, gone home to Newark but slipping back into Harlem to continue his light with Larry Neal, Askia and crew, sane and insane, enjoying the madness of Harlem summer 68, Nikki, Sonia, Haki, June Jordan, Pharaoh Sanders, Archie Shepp and the Ayler brothers, and more, more, Farrakhan at Mosque #7, Akbar Muhammad and Donald Cunningham at the book store, the book store of the world at 125th and 7th Aveneue, Mr. what was his name, the master book seller? Harlem, 1969, a dream come true for a Cali Negro, swimming in the sea of his people.

Fuck Vietnam and Fuck America. And there was Cleaver in Mount Morris Park saying he would kiss the pussy of Fannie Lou Hamer as I stood and watched. And Bobby Seale was at 125th and 7th Avenue, reciting my poem Burn, Baby, Burn, and James Foreman trying to lecture to the people on Franz Fanon, and on and on and on. And Dr. Ben and John Henry Clarke rapping on history and consciousness and beyond, etc.,etc.,etc.

Marvin X at 73, May 29, 1944

What a wonderful journey
wonderful life
running from the devil
running away wives
most wonderful children
some strange like me
but never had to shout
never had to beat
praise mothers
step fathers
those grandchildren
all generals bossy bossy
where they get that from
worst friends in the world mama said
baraka sun ra eldridge huey bobby
mama didn't understand
they had wild imaginations
like her son
wanted freedom
freedom or death
we on't give a fuck
exile jail prison underground
overground
black listed white listed
unlisted
colleges universities showed me the door
a bit much for most
overwhelming
youth say he's very blunt
white folks say they can read between his lines
love his creativity
hate his personality
Printer say man, you don't like nobody
that's what I got out yo book
no, I just question everybody
whose shit don't stink
don't give a damn whacha say bout me

I'm free
James Sweeney say I'm the most free nigguh
in non-free Amerikkka
wrote my books
said what I want to say
so what if I shoot myself in the foot
it's my foot fuck it
what a wonderful journey
what a wonderful life
what a wonderful world
even without a wife
what wife could endure me
too much creative energy
call it insanity
I'm just me
work hard party hard
with my ten friends
you never see
gotta feed them
my eternal company.
what a wonderful world
wonderful time to be alive
see the devil on the run
death angels on his ass
I just laugh
my name is Jess
I ain't in this mess
Sun Ra said you didn't let me enjoy yo gladness
I don't wanna enjoy yo sadness
sing a happy song
how long has this been goin on
thank you ancestors for yr blood
you make me do the good I do
I would be deaf dumb and blind
if not for you
thank you mama and daddy
thank you granny with yr loving hands
thank you great grandfather Ephraim Murrill
20 years a slave saw lincoln
died in Madera
gotta go see his grave
what a wonderful journey
what a wonderful world
--Marvin X