" Glad someone shot deserved to be shot finally,
George Wallace. After you send your basket of balms
And berries for the girls the bomb buried in Birmingham,
After you add your palms to the psalms & palm covered
Caskets of the girls the bomb buried in Birmingham,
I’ll muster a pinch of prayer for you. You are the blind
Protagonist of a story that begins, “In my previous life
My work involved returning runaway slaves to slavery,”
And ends with the image of a black nurse pushing
Your old ass in a wheelchair. Can you guess what black
Folk passing empty cotton fields feel, George Wallace?
I damn you with the opposite of that feeling. I keep thinking
I’m confessing for the first time, the reason I fear you,
And you keep asking why I’m telling this old story again. "

― Terrance Hayes, , American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin