Indigo Blues
(Dedicated to ancestor Dr. Amos Wilson)
(the audio of this poem is temporarily unavailable)
It started benign enough with a financial gift
to help establish
a research facility
then the
announcement of the cloning of Dolly the sheep
then the
cloning of animal meat for human consumption
as time passed or as economic political strife grew
some institute
think tank
academic
bureaucrat
strategist
came up with the “brilliant”
idea
let’s clone a labor force
for our national betterment
to make the clones readily identifiable
they decided to make the clones’ skin tone blue
however after objective analysis and rational thought
the cost of indigo was cost prohibitive
so they scrapped the plan and settled on using you.
By Kemit Mawakana (aka The Seven-Foot Poet)
Peace (when appropriate) War (when necessary)
Copyright 2004.
Kemit Mawakana (aka “The Seven-Foot Poet”) is a highly acclaimed spoken-word artist, and has published two books A . . . Z . . . Infinity and Crucifixion of My Soul. The collective body of his works presented weekly in BAR are in tribute to Listervelt Middleton, Dr. John Henrik Clarke, and “For The People”. Currently, he is a facilitator at AYA Educational Institute (www.ayaed.com) and can be reached at sevenfootpoet@gmail.com.
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This lecture was delivered on February 3, 2026, at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver (Canada) for the monthly series “Black History and the Project of Black Studies.”
