Many of the perpetrators of crimes against our sons are white policemen.  If you doubt this, ask an African American Man.  Almost any will do.  He'll probably say something like my slightly built 5'6" friend from college once said: "I have been stopped by the police at least a dozen times, and I have never committed a crime."

Most frighteningly, my son could become a target of other kids, many of whom are Black, who are mesmerized by our culture of toughness.  Today, little girls sing along with M. C. Lyte about wanting a guy who is a "roughneck" and plenty of boys seem glad to comply.  Some will pull a knife or a gun on another teenager for an imagined slight, or for no reason at all.

It's even possible, no one who knows my son can see it, but there is a possibility that he could decide to become such a youth.  Either way, there is a clear bottom line:

BLACK BOYS ARE DYING EVERYWHERE AND EVERY DAY, IN AMERICA.

Up to this point, and not entirely to my credit, I've kept my terror, over the carnage, in check.  It's been many years since my older son was brutally beaten by the Police.  Those were years in which the resulting hole in my stomach should have been filled.

I never want to feel that yawningly open, that empty, that hatred, ever again.  I'm beginning to think, really think, of what it means to have my youngest son out of my sight.  I think that someone could take him away from me.  He doesn't know how often I watch him, curled up in sleep or how I sit dumbly, marveling at him.  "Look", I say, "how much space he takes up, in and out side of my heart".

I remember his first words and my squeal of delight when he took his first duck like steps.  Then too, there is my prideful anxiety of his natural trust, when he greets strangers in the street with a friendly "Hello".  I think, with pride, of how people say, after they have talked with him, that he is "so smart and self-possessed".

Awashed in love, bedazzled by it, I think: "If people only knew you, they could never hurt you."

But Black Women's children are hurt everyday.  There was the woman who was called and told that here son had died in a car accident.  Later, the autopsy revealed fatal blows and dog bites over his body, which were not caused by a car crash.

Then, there was that young Brother who was snatched from his mother's home and taken in for questioning.  He found himself face down on the ground with a knee pressing on the back of his neck, while being handcuffed, with a police pistol at his head.  Hours later, when the matter was finally cleared up and he was released, no one even bothered to say "Sorry".

Each day, Mother's sons die and no one ever even pauses.  I don't like thinking this.  I don't like knowing that soon my son and I will have to talk, more pointedly than ever, about all of this hurt and death.

Afterward, I'll ask my friend, a Black Man who understands too well, to repeat the rules that every child, especially a Black male one, should know:

Never be cocky or make fast moves with a cop!  Never fight, if it is possible, walk away!  Know that your Manhood is defined, not by what is in your pants or on your back, but by the responsibility and self respect in your heart.  Watch where you are, and who you are with.  Remember that it is possible for anyone to be carrying a gun.

As years pass, I will say these thing over and over.  And every so often, I'll remind him, and everyone else who'll listen, of what the world will suggest that he forget, of what I repeat as I stare at him sleeping:

Joy