‘Sable Man Windbreaker’ : The credo of the African-American male, written out of hope, stresses dignity and self-respect.

Driving down a major boulevard in Los Angeles one afternoon in August, 1991, I noticed an unusual number of black men panhandling at service stations, convenience stores and fast-food restaurants, begging mostly white individuals for the opportunity to clean their car windows for small change.

I witnessed motorist after motorist hastily roll up their windows or withdraw from the men, all of whom looked as though they hadn’t washed in days, maybe weeks. The only difference between those men and me was that I was groomed and wore clean clothing.

Those men were being treated as though they were contagious or were some kind of dangerous subhuman specie. But I reasoned then that I could have been one of those pathetic individuals if I allowed myself for a moment to lose all hope and dwell on a false notion that striving and laboring for a better tomorrow was futile. If I allowed that kind of hopelessness to permeate my thinking, yes, I could be out there begging quarters too.

But realizing that every man--whether black, white or brown--is not equally strong, and that for black males in particular, whose numbers greatly contribute to the ever-rising casualties in a society whose compassion grows colder by the day, I knew that as the Bible commands the strong, I had a duty and a responsibility to “bear the infirmities of the weak.�

And not looking for the U.S. government or any civil-rights organization to come to the rescue of downtrodden African-American males, who undeniably stand square in the cross hairs of homicide, cancer, AIDS, penal incarceration, unemployment, hopelessness and despair, I took it upon myself to contribute to the cure for this disease that preys heavily on African-American males every moment of their existence.

I penned “Sable Man Windbreaker� early one morning. The message flowed from my spirit like a stream.

The credo reads in part:

I Sable Man, will be downtrodden no more. No longer will I think of myself as inferior, nor will I ever again lose my dignity and self-respect.

I was not made by God to be a footstool, nor am I of a lower creation.

I am like the light of the sun, the roar of a storm, the surge of the Nile.

I have the strength of kings and the gentleness of lambs. I am a lover of self, not possessed of self-hatred, and I am endued with a measure of greatness foreordained by God, and now I stand ready to reassume my rightful place in God’s earthly order as a sparkling jewel, for he has favored me to be many wonders for my people who cry for the leadership of the men. . . .

I am the windbreaker. I walk into the teeth of the wind and bear the brunt of the gale. I am an oak tree, tall, strong and true . . . rough around the edges, bearing the harsh elements, scraping the cosmos, shielding the little flower. . . .

The balance of the message likens African-American males to powerful images in nature:

I am like the lightning, immeasurable volts of power, brazen, emboldened, leaving my scorched imprint in the earth. . . .

. . . like the rainbow, a gentle arc of peace, coolly bending in the mist like a neon apparition, a soothing calm, whispering assurance for tomorrow . . .