9 Minutes in May

In the first minute

My legs are taken from me

They will not let me stand

Like a man brought from a boat

I am laid to rest on the earth

In the second minute

I struggle to understand

Why the weight of the world

Is pressed upon me

In the shape of four men

In the third minute

I plead

I call out to my mama

I call for consideration

For basic decency

In the fourth minute

I hurt

I announce my pain and they press harder

There is a crack in the ground

They are trying to force me into

In the fifth minute

I cannot breath

That most basic of actions since birth

Is denied me

I am a 240 pound infant they are strangling

In the sixth minute

I see the darkness

I am looking at myself

As they see me

The absence of a person

There is a seventh minute that passes

There is an eighth

There is a ninth minute I will never see

But the world will

Over and over until I am heard

I am not George Floyd

We are