COMPLY! COMPLY! COMPLY!

You can comply and still die!

Too often I hear officers and American citizens scream:
COMPLY!
They ignore the hypocrisy that the word implies.
Cops can break my jaw and kill all our innocent kin.
However, we acquit the cop and implicitly forgive his sin.

COMPLY! COMPLY! COMPLY!
It is a grandiose and obnoxious lie.
Blood runs down the street as we watch American citizens die.
America seems oblivious to the ratatatat of a police officer's gun
It sometimes seems as if cops like shooting brown men for fun.
A brown family loses a loved one, and Americans turn their heads.
It is just another death filmed for the viral feeds of the dead.

COMPLY! COMPLY! COMPLY!
Screams a cop as he beats our children and mothers with his fists.
COMPLY!
A disabled father is blown away, but Americans don give a sh!t

Tears fall for the innocents, but in time their story is lost.
Tamir Rice's valuable life was stolen, and we still ignore the cost.  
Cities pay victims, but the bloodstained guilt goes unavenged.
Racists in uniform continue to victimize innocent brown men.

COMPLY! COMPLY! COMPLY!
They scream as they beat our brains out with their batons.
COMPLY!  
Is often the last word heard as officers confuse a taser for a gun!

No apology has ever sincerely been offered, and no justice has been received.
However, too many of Americans agree and scream COMPLY! while brown men
are shot in their backs or choked out on their knees.

© Eddie K. Phillips

Reviews

[Indra's Child]

Powerful poetry. It's message is sadly true... And so very significant right now. People need to care about this!! The more time people spend ignoring it, the more lives are lost. INNOCENT lives.... Lives of human beings taken by sociopathic, sometimes PTSD riddled, racist, sadistic murderers with badges. It seems systematic.. But they don't even follow protocol when they "suspect" people of- what? It's always, shoot first, never reach for the nonlethal weapon.

[Richard McLin]

Hard stuff to read, hard stuff to write, but it's all very necessary. Great write, very powerful, and well written. I loved the flow, structure, and word usage. The change in size is the way you needed to write it to fully capture the power of the words in this piece. Great job.
-Richard

[Tate Morgan]

A sad truth we all know it to be so. The culture reeks of racism in the states. I had hoped we might outgrow this But we havent

[Eddie Phillips]

Tate, I agree with your sentiments. It is a painful thing to watch as young folks suffer from ignorance that should have been expunged long ago.

[Paul Bell]

Can only agree with you.
Don't know how many times I've seen black guys being beaten or shot.
It's like the Police think every Black American is a criminal.

[Eddie Phillips]

It is sad that we allow officers to consistently play into biased stereotypes and conditioning while enforcing the law. The results are deadly and the numbers are staggering. Thanks for stopping by to read this poem. It is raw and a little visceral but it drives home a point in ways my other poems failed to do. I will be stopping by again to read more of your writing also.

[Travis Gibson (poetic h..]

Standing O! There is nothing, but strength and frustration here... it's tangible! Looking forward to reading more of your work!

[Eddie Phillips]

Emotion and truth have to come across in a poem like this. I am glad that my truth and anger reached you through this poem. I have been writing more social pieces lately and I noticed it started to run away my reviewers. LOL I however will not run away form a horrible and preventable issue like police brutality! Thank you again for reading.

[Travis Gibson (poetic heroics)]

Unfortunately, many prefer to straddle the fence as opposed to choosing a side. It's exactly what allows these forms of social injustices to thrive. Hopefully, one day we will all stand as one against them.