Down in the holler we rest in caves and toss dry knuckle bones and agate rocks to see our future. We start dark fires in our dens and raise our arms to the skies while sparks fly heavenward and chant our animal pain as the war toms thump in maroon red distance. We are men debased, broke down in Southern floods, the great deluge as the earth's skin opens in hissing, spitting caverns.

Our friends dodge rockets in desert wasteland. Our sisters kill and are killed in the fertile crescent. Our brothers sit in metal beasts and see death coming in green tracer lights. Cousin be strong.

Let's make a pact—that when our criminal king is gone and all this land scorched and barren, and the earth becomes clay and mud and sand again, we'll meet in a long grass field where the winds blow and seek to raise the massacred heart of our people.

Until then watch our pain radiate forth and cook the sky in shimmering waves. See their silver birds bolt the heavens to the clouds, to the stars like sunrays. We are animals and we are men debased, torn away in tossing heaves, the brooding doom as the earth bends, shakes, and thunders with iron, tar, and steel. And will you watch or turn away when the fire comes raining down?

Cousin let's make a pact. Let's beat our fists against the glass walls and stone ceilings. Let's dodge great coffins that drop from the sky to scatter our bodies torn in twain. Cousin be strong.

We talk in letters and on phones and in the streets and we're afraid we've been down too long to change. But as survivors we transcend. As fighters we climb higher. Cousin be strong.