COMMEMORATION
One day in 1723
Was born a man that came to be
A rabble rouser for the free
One day, that lives in infamy
Have you been told?
Not much is known about the man
Who stood and improvised a plan
To show how much our people can
Inspire all to face The Man
So long ago
Born in the bonds of slavery
He broke the chains and ran to sea
And rode the ocean's reverie
A life spent in the open free
Respected travelled burnished, he
Had come to Boston for a spree
Who knew that soon his name would be
One tied to us inexorably?
In 1770, one night
Some British soldiers found a fight
A barber was not paid outright
And soon the town moved to incite
With our man in lead
Words were exchanged the tempers flared
And soon before they were aware
The people armed with snow and stone
They moved to make the men atone
Our man and others had enough
And tried to call the British bluff
Upon approach there rang a shot
Our man was struck there on that spot!
That shot heard all around the world
Became the revolution's pearl
His death became the rally call
To start the war that won it all.
How soon we forget.
- dedicated to Crispus Attucks
A man of indigenous lineage from Africa and the Americas
He was the first person to die in the cause of the American Revolution.
As we commemorate the 250th anniversary of the Boston Massacre on this day, March 5, 2020, let this be a reminder:
That black people- from Attucks, to Tubman, to the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, to the Tuskegee Airmen, to Martin Luther King, to Marsha P Johnson, to Thurgood Marshall, to Shirley Chisholm, to Barack Obama-
have not now, nor ever,
Been
Your
Enemy.