Asia comes from repossessed dreams
and nightmares that last as long as
the absence of her father
I think that the reason her clothes are always so Boa
Constricting any amount of longing she might have felt
for him to me
Daniel spent his childhood running
from Richmond bullets and the ghost
of his dad
Daniel is a thug
He brags about seeing grown men
ground to dust under heavy boots for
their iPhones and their wallets
He rocks a long gold chain, and two
diamond earrings with
every outfit
Daniel only cares about money
but I can see genius bursting
from his pained skin
It is the deepest black, pure
like Earth's blood
but for some reason, most
seem to see it as an impurity.
He paints himself a gangster
to cover what they call ugly
Jonathan chooses to come
to class once a month
or whenever we have a sub
He shoots dice in the back corner of the
classroom with Duma and Daniel
When I ask them why, they
tell me money is everything.
It seems they are the products
of a broken society and a torn home
My home is not broken
My parents are divorced but
they get along
I haven't known death to
come close,
and violence hasn't found me
vulnerable
And then, while sitting in
1st period pretending
to read Macbeth, it
clicked for me
My classmates and I are different
In the words of Dr. King
our elbows are
together yet our hearts
are apart
I'm not asking for some all
holy savior to come and
coddle us into equality
I'm asking for you to
understand our struggles and
our hardships
To understand that if we have to
learn with each other we should also
learn about each other so we can
bring each other up
This poem by Obasi Davis is certainly something to critically think about. It is taken from the book written by Christopher Emdin, FOR WHITE FOLKS WHO TEACH IN THE HOOD AND THE REST OF Y'ALL TOO: REALITY PEDAGOGY AND URBAN EDUCATION and after reading it, I felt compelled to share it with my Critical Thinker audience.
Join me live as I host The Reading Circle with Marc Medley each Saturday beginning at 6 a.m. ET on gobrave.org and on FM radio WP88.7 FM in northern New Jersey. You are also invited to follow me on Twitter @thinkcritical01 and readingcircle01.
.jpg)
