Painful

By Joshua Mills

You know it's Painful

Painful to see you lose
all your hopes and dreams
and become a substance fiend.

Painful

Painful to see all my
beautiful black people
give up on life.

Come on people
it's time to wake up, rise up
as the people we are
and stop pushing poison
into our veins.

It's time to show how successful and powerful
we are as black women and men.

This poem written by 8th Grader Joshua Mills won 1st Place in the 2011 Drug Free Week Poetry Contest at West Briar Middle School.  Aside from the prizes he won from the school, I promised to publish it for him to the masses. 

Why?

By Vaniecia Williams

Why did you walk into my life

only to walk out of it five minutes later?

You came to me . . .

You pursued me . . .

You asked me . . .

You shared with me.

Then you have an epiphany about a long time friend

Suddenly, we cease to exist.

“I love her beyond us being friends”  

“I prayed and made a promise to God that I have to keep”

“I don’t want you to hate or be angry with me”

“I just want you to understand that I have to follow my heart.”

What about me?

Scared to tell me . . .

Scared to hurt me . . .

Scared to lose me . . .

So what does that say?

Didn’t expect to fall so hard?

Yeah you know, we both know

Yeah I love you, so do you

There I said it, you said it too . . .

Why?

This poem was written for a friend who lost the man in her life to another woman.  It was based on her description of events.