President Obama appears to me to have elevated and implemented the artist-activist concept to the role of empowered servant-leader.

In your hands winter is a book with cloud pages that snow pearls of love.

Millions cheer the warriorspilling blood across the ringwhile the one who stands for peaceis ridiculed and shamed.Must hearts forever sufferfrom ignorance and greed?Can bombs heal our soulsor set our spirits free?

Literary genres and techniques tend to take form in one's mind somewhat the way computer templates provide form for different computer tasks.

With my ninth mind I resurrect my first and dance slow to the music of my soul made new.

The birth of a true poet is neither an insignificant event nor an easy delivery. Complications generally begin long before the fated soul carries its dubious light into whatever womb has been kind enough to volunteer the intricate machinery of its blood and prayers and muscles for a gestation period much longer than nine months or even nine years.

Most of the more celebrated names among African-American authors, poets, and artists are known to the world because of their association with specific cultural arts movements.