A poem that counts

     Recently I discovered (at Poets.org) this thought-provoking number-poem by Oklahoma poet Quraysh Ali Lansana.

bible belted: math     by Quraysh Ali Lansana 

          Pro-Black doesn’t mean anti-anything.
                   El Hajj Malik El-Shabazz (Malcolm X)

there are at least twenty-seven
white people i love. i counted.

four from high school, five from
undergraduate years, maybe  

three from grad school
(one gay=bonus points) &

an assortment of compelling
melanin-deprived miscreants

in chicago & countrywide.
two brothas in the afterlife

remain why i add rather than
subtract.

From Lansana's collection The Walmart Republic (Mongrel Empire Press, 2014).