“LEGACY OF HATRED AND FRONTIER JUSTICE” by Joseph Osel

“This poem describes the American lineage of white supremacy, it's evolution into modern policing and the impending/resultant #retributiveviolence.”

Joseph Osel is a critical theorist, writer and Editor. His impending book is Revolutionary – Antiracism: Resistance & Camaraderie In Theory & Praxis. This poem is from his forthcoming collection Catastrophe In Miniature: Poetry In Fatal Tense (2016).

 

LEGACY OF HATRED AND FRONTIER JUSTICE

Groups of men patrol plantations
to prevent uprisings
and whip any caught
a bloody framework for subsequent activities

dreamed up in winter
Grand ghouls soon acquire
sinister significance

Time would not relinquish
power
code
freedom

a blind eye
refusing seat
ripe for hijacking
rides disguised around the streets
fashioned grotesque masks
and adopted oaths

The primary targets of
violence turned to violence
—and quickly spread beyond.