Startled symptomatic of being ensnared. An ear attuned anxiety caught in the corner of the peripheral eye: the cotton-tail rabbit frozen in the wash of oncoming high beams. A scampering soon bloody thing— a “trigger word” like someone says “bomb” in an airport, or a crowded Starbucks. The jaded optimism seated before an appeals board. The institutional doo-dah shuffle. (The same logic that encourages the most marginalized to make do in a system positioned against them, rather than questioning the historical & social conditions.) The dissonant mewl of fearful at the edges of national security, into which an enemy must be created. The fear of shouldering to the center of panic-stepping semantically around #blacklivesmatter, their rage colored the shattering of store-front glass & just how so much of it has to do with anticipation.

henry 7. reneau, jr. writes words of conflagration to awaken the world ablaze, an inferno of free verse illuminated by his affinity for disobedience, like a chambered bullet that commits a felony every day, an immolation that blazes from his heart, phoenix-fluxed red & gold, exploding through change is gonna come to implement the fire next time. He is the author of the poetry collection, freedomland blues (Transcendent Zero Press) and the e-chapbook, physiography of the fittest (Kind of a Hurricane Press), now available from their respective publishers. Additionally, he has self-published a chapbook entitled 13hirteen Levels of Resistance, and his collection, The Book Of Blue(s) : Tryin’ To Make A Dollar Outta’ Fifteen Cents, was a finalist for the 2018 Digging Press Chapbook Series. His work has also been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.