Fire Hose

5/1/2015

hai·ku
俳句

They riot over championships.
We riot over injustice.

The steady drip of water can wear down a rock
or reshape a mountain.
A fire hose can create a directed blast of water that measures upwards of 400 pounds per square inch.
That’s equivalent to the full concentrated weight of a male gorilla standing in a space too small for even a pawn on a chessboard.

The fire hose
is used to extinguish a flame before its heat can be felt.
Before the flame leaves its telltale black scorch marks.

A pressure washer
is used to clean the black and grime off walls.
It’s used on sidewalks to wash away dead leaves,
animal feces
or the blackened stains left by our machines.

Fire hoses have also been used to extinguish the flame of a people whose fire was ignited by a desire to be equal,
they dared to march in streets until their heat could be felt.

Pressure washers or “water cannons” are used to wash away the black and drown out the voice.
It can flick a man off his feet like

check

mate,

they killed our King.

You can see video of such cannons hurling droplets with the weight of 400-pound gorillas,
cleaning sidewalks and city streets of people
like the black of them is a stain to be removed
with all the reverence afforded to dead leaves and animal shit.

NEVER FORGET!!

Life is a curious thing.

Animal feces are essential in the spreading and germination of some seeds.
The decay of dead things feeds the tallest trees and the deepest grass roots.
Water hoses can also bring the fluid of life to the most barren of places.

Did you know,
that the stench of feces and decaying things is flammable?

Keep killing us.
Keep shitting on us.
You are only making us stronger,
and eventually there will not be enough material
to create the hoses
to contain the water
needed
to put out our flame!

~Christopher Michael (Persona Non Grata, 2015)