Blackbirdan online journal of literature and the artsSpring 2018  Vol. 17 No. 1
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back JUSTIN ROVILLOS MONSON

Conjure Song
featuring Drake

Derek, my bro, my ace, my G
help me conjure the bloom of the young
one you just delivered
help me bring it back way

way back to the Frank’s RedHot
on liquor store chips, the pink tall tees
we rocked over our small wings like Killa
Cam. Then back back when we flew over fences
toward the feral darkness, pulling out
of parking lots in your Mazda with the leather
seats & the thunder-filled trunk

all those nights we blew
smoked to a stupor
below the ashen shells
of someone else’s dream

& you, Ray, my accomplice, tight-lipped bulldog
of a brother, help me conjure the first
track we recorded—remember that?

Remember that, bruh.

How I finished our chorus:

I will never fade away

Do not burden yourself
but lend me some strength
& a rucksack for my journey

lend me your lighter words
& freestyles that I might dazzle
a few local governors & warriors

O brothers of my youth
I am chained & imperfect
I am savage & made of redwater
I speak of nation when I really mean
light & the physics of loneliness

the sweet tinge of blood in my mouth
as I spit the bars of another:

don’t tell me that you knew it would be like this
all along / I know the truth is you won’t love me
until I’m gone / and even then the thing
that comes after is moving on

‘Cause, my brothers, I am so damn
charged & at a hustle to escape
the bitter regions of my body
& its nation-state of a dumb heart

Show me the renegade warbler
for I sing of hustlers & saints  


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