[Brer Rabbit]

2012. That's damn good vision

He spat, his gums calloused by neglect

Grinned and crisped into a red delicious

Its skin zesty, the air was sweetness

His skin was stretched and ancient

Cracked and seemed like a patch of pavement

Much too often and just as dark in pigment

He was my grandfather

The dwindling town knew him as Moses

His dwindling comrades call him Moe

I don't know if it was his age

Or the way he caused folks to move away

The air was damp but not suffocating

The stoop was ramshackle and yet sturdy

Treacherous, like the conversation

But still able to bear gravity's ambush

He was silent as he let the four numbers

Ricochet against permutations

Of broken dreams and personal triumphs

He spat out half of an apple seed

"Look at us, we're one foot removed

From working this very land without choice

One foot removed from the Promised Land

And did you know that Moses never made it to Canaan?"

His question was piercing, his eyes were bloodshot

Recalling more life than I could fathom

I tried not recoil under his vulnerability

And gave my response as I bit into the apple

"The Hebrews themselves did not enter the Promised Land

Until long after they arrived

They had to fight, and wander and wait

Before they were able to open their eyes

We are still fighting and wandering and waiting

We have fled enslavement and parted waters

We have seen the horizons promised

But we have not yet fully arrived

God had told Moses that it was his destiny

But Moses never believed that promise

But if we apply better the perfect vision

We will find the Promised Land among us"

I spat out an uncracked apple seed

It landed in the soil beside the broken one

My Grandfather smiled at me and said

"If we keep this up we'll have a whole damn orchard"

If prophecies are self-fulfilling

Interpreting scriptures predicts the future

And sharing better the perfect vision

Is building up a new world