I Am…Poetry

Okay, I’m on record as saying that I’m not a big poetry fan.  But, it’s not often that poetry moves me to tears.  Yet, when I saw a CNN filler story, pretty much lifted whole from WROC-TV, about nine and ten year olds in Rochester New York, who were assigned to write “I am…” poetry about themselves, I found myself blubbering like a baby with a heart breaking and melting at the same time.  The simple elegance and eloquence exhibited by these young people would soften the heart of the grinchiest Grinch, and make generous the heart of a Scrooge.  If people like Jo(k)e Biden really want to know from  “articulate,” the potery of these children would be a good place for them to look.

I am…

I am a boy who can see everything in black.

I wonder if they will invade my house.

I hear gunshots talising to my door bang bang!

I see people crying and tieing people up.

I want to see the white and blue.

I am a boy who can see black.

I pretend I’m in a hunted house.

I feel frightened.

I touch the phone ready to call for help.

I worry that they will bust through.

I cry when the door open.

I am a boy who can see everything in black.

- Taivon Phipps -

Oh, man.  I can’t do justice to these kids’ eloquence, especially when I can barely catch my breath, or see through the tears.   Their letters to Santa are just as moving, touching and beautiful, like Luis’, the boy pictured at the top of the post, or this one:

What’s up, Santa?  How have you been?  Tell Mrs. Clause I said what’s up girlfriend.  Tell Rudolph his nose is still red like a cherry.

I want to tell you my Christmas list.  It’s not the same as last year.  I saw you asked if I wanted toys.  This year I want something for our community.

I want you to do something special for me.  Can you stop the gangs?  They say bad things to old people.  They should respect their elders.  They steal from people.  They’re mean.  They use bad things to hurt other people.  That’s all I want.

Sincerely,

- Diamani Madden -

Nobody asked these kids to write about gangs, crime, violence, fear and pain.  They were asked to describe who they were, or to write a simple letter to Santa.  How sad that that’s what they see, and how they see themselves.  Shame on us as a society.  How dare we congratulate ourselves for electing a black man president, when that man lives in a neighborhood where children like these live in the same kind of fear, facing the same kinds of threats that the poets of Rochester do, and the most we know that he’s done is avert his gaze from their suffering as he drives past them in his bulletproof custom limo?  These children don’t just write of direct violence, they speak of relatives lost…to jail, or just…lost, as in the case of Destani Williams, who says she’s a girl who’s lost her mother, and fears she died.  Where did Destani’s mother go?  She doesn’t tell us, just that her Mom’s gone, leaving her sad and afraid.

36 children have been murdered in Chicago this year, as of May, 8, that is.  In August of last year, as the Democratic party was all up in itself, patting itself on the back for ramming a black president down the throats of half its base, many still vocally, vehemently reluctant to embrace him at that time, Unity Pony Nomination Party be damned, the Chicago Sun-Times was reporting that the city’s children’s greatest fear was getting shot.  The kids’ fear is well grounded.  On March 9, the same paper reported that between September, 2007, and December, 2008, 508 of them had been shot.  How many more have been threatened?  Stabbed?  Beaten up?

Is this Barack Obama’s fault?  Some would automatically say “no,” but I’m not that charitable.  When he refuses to even acknowledge the special problems plaguing a community to which he ostensibly belongs, and which he has to see every day as he makes his way home, whether on the South Side of Chicago, or the neighborhoods surrounding the White House, I say he has to be held accountable for turning a blind eye.  And, while disparities in employment and educational opportunities are a big part of the community dysfunction that creates the climate of fear and violence that is shaping these kids lives and untimely deaths, even that reality is not something Brother Pretendident is willing to address with specificity:

Well, keep in mind that every step we’re taking is designed to help all people. But, folks who are most vulnerable are most likely to be helped because they need the most help.

So when we passed the Recovery Act, for example, and we put in place provisions that would extend unemployment insurance or allow you to keep your health insurance even if you’ve lost your job, that probably disproportionately impacted those communities that had lost their jobs. And unfortunately, the African-American community and the Latino community are probably overrepresented in those ranks.

When we put in place additional dollars for community health centers to ensure that people are still getting the help that they need, or we expand health insurance to millions more children through the Children’s Health Insurance Program, again, those probably disproportionately impact African-American and Latino families simply because they’re the ones who are most vulnerable. They have got higher rates of uninsured in their communities.

So my general approach is that if the economy is strong, that will lift all boats as long as it is also supported by, for example, strategies around college affordability and job training, tax cuts for working families as opposed to the wealthiest that level the playing field and ensure bottom-up economic growth.

And I’m confident that that will help the African-American community live out the American dream at the same time that it’s helping communities all across the country.

Like a society matron dressed in a designer gown, dripping in jewels, stepping over a sleeping street person on her way to a Help the Homeless charity ball, Barracko Bama, Bamboozler-in-Chief, feigns ignorance of the roots and reality of the problems he pretends to tackle head on, in order to avoid getting his hands dirty while actually trying to do something about it.  It’s not like it’s his fault he has to sign a bill allowing people to carry guns in national parks to get the illusion of credit card reform passed, right?  You think knowing how many kids die of gunshots a courageous, compassionate father man might have taken this opportunity to take a stand?  Unfortunately, while far too many Americans give him a pass on this kind of cavalier indifference, far too many American children live in fear of dying in violence.

And, too many actually die.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jstb6yvIKNg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3q0gqpOyx9o