I give honor to GOD for giving strength to my African American Ancestors that were snatched from their native home land, the Mother country of Africa. They were stolen and robbed of their culture and rich history by the hands of white ghosts.

Malcolm X called them Devils. These evil people forced their imperalist ways upon our ancestors because they felt it was their right. The Africans were trapped like prisoners and life for them was never the same. I am sure they always dreamed of their home land and the freedom that they once had. How can anyone just take someone away from their families and destroy their hearts and soul by dividing our bloodline? This devasting horrifying tradgedy that was forced upon us because a white man felt that it was his right. He felt that it was his right because he is suppose to be superior, right? WRONG! So I give gratitude to the Africans who became slaves against their will. Thank you for enduring the pain of watching your children, wife, husband, mother, and father being sold without you ever in life seeing them again. How broken hearted you must have been.

Thank you for enduring the pain of being severly whipped into a state of unconciousness and adnauseam. Thank you for working in the fields in "the hotter than hell heat". Thank you for being lynched for trying to run for freedom or for protecting your son or daughter from being beaten or sold.

I thank my African sister whom I look at as Queens and white folks look at as a "head rag wearing mammy maid" whose only good enough to scrub there floors, throw out the "pee" from the pee buckets, breast feed their white babies and not having enough milk left in their breasts to feed their own babies. The babies that you got inside of you because Mr. Massa felt that it was his right, his privilege to rape you, because he owned you. I thank you African sister, my Queen.

I thank my African brothers who were whipped into submission because you tried to fight Mr. Massa for taking your wife right in front of you. I thank you for being lynched for having sex with there white wives because she forced you and when getting caught she cried rape, knowing all along that she desired your strong hard body just as Massa desired the African sisters softness and beautifully developed figures. No one is deserving of such ignominious treatment.

I thank you African brother, my King. Even after slavery ended we still lived our lives in fear. We were basically still slaves. There was more pain to endure. More deaths. So lets not forget the four little girls who were bombed to death at church during Sunday school while worshipping Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. These beautiful little girls were killed by an ill-minded ignorant person whose heart was filled with hate instead of love. And Emmett Till, beaten and lynched beyond recognition.

I thank his mother for leaving the coffin open for the whole world to see what hate did to her son. May all the African American children and teen-agers continue to study about our struggle. May they never forget and always be proud of our ancestors who paved the way for them. Some "white folks" are in denial about what happened to our people during that time. Many of them wished that slavery days was still around. There are Ku Klux Klans on our jobs, they will find a way to fire you and to keep you from moving up in your career. They are in our schools, they want you to fail. There are police officers that stop you while driving black they "AIM TO KILL" and ask questions later.

Some of us are still enslaved. What I mean by that-is this- We kill each other now. The Klan doesn't have to kill us anymore. All the Klan has to do is just sit back and laugh when one of our brothers is killed because of a drive by, or because another brother wanted our sneakers, or leather jacket and our car. They love to see that we are not educated. Substance abuse, weapons, and welfare and no education are just another way to keep us enslaved. We have to stop killing each other. Thats being a fool.

Let's stop the crab in the barrel attitude. Let us not envy and fill our hearts with jealousy when we get a better job, or that college education or experience military life, or buy that new house and car that we have worked and saved every penny for. Let's just stay strong the way the slaves did. Let us remember what Dr. King marched for. He didn't do it so that we could kill each other. We are a strong beautiful creative race. So lets keep marching and singing we shall overcome. Because we will if we work together.

As I come to a closing, I will never forget and I will be so ever grateful and humble to my ancestors that were enslaved. And to Harriett Tubman, Marcus Garvey, Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Dr. Martin L. King, Jr., Angela Davis, Stokely Carmichael, Mandela, John and Robert Kennedy. And I can't leave out my grandfather Mr. John Flowers a strong black man with a third grade education. He built his own house and raised 12 children.

I give thanks to my grandmother who taught my granddad how to read his very first book, which was the bible. She was a determined strong black woman. Thank you all and many, many more who stood up for our equal rights. I am also thankful to some of the white people who helped us as much as they could, some of them wanted a change. They opened up their hearts and marched with Dr. King to try and make the United States Of America a fair country. We all have to remember what our ancestors and leaders went through. They stood up for our freedom and rights. So to the slaves and to some of the leaders that died, I SALUTE YOU, BECAUSE YOU DID NOT DIE IN VAIN!