Paper Crowns

Black King, 
naw fam I don’t want the crown. 
Kings get overthrown. 
Kings have to watch their back 
from the velvet daggers 
inside their own home.  
They’ll praise you  to your face
but behind your back plotting 
how to take your place. 
Back stabbers who are familiar 
and the ones unknown. 


Black Kings have to take on 
every Killmonger 
who challenges the throne.
A King’s rise can be meteoric. 
A King’s fall will be historic 
never letting him live down his mistakes from the smallest 
to the most horrid. 
I’m not about that life. 


So Don’t anoint me a Black King 
I don’t want the scepter. 
I mean no disrespect to you 
Black Kings and Queens out there 
nor our ancestors. 
You see, daddy taught me 
that power doesn’t come from a crown 
or the color of my skin. 
He told me that I’ll be respected 
for the kind of man that I am from within. 
So give me my wife, my children, 
and throw in my best friend. 
Give me a house and some land 
and let me live what’s left of my life 
until I meet a very aged and timely end. 
And when that day comes, 
that’s when I’ll take up my crown. 
One given to me by the man who willingly laid his life down.