Maybe they took themselves a three-day weekend.
LaTenya comes over, walking all slow.
She’s wearing her hair in lots of braids
and she even got some cowry shells in some of them.
And the cowry shells make a little bit of noise
A nice noise.
You know you got some pretty eyes, LaTenya says to me
My eyes just eyes but LaTenya’s looking at them
like she’s seeing them for the first time
and maybe later on I’ll go back to Miss Edna’s house
and look in the mirror at my eyes
try to see what she’s seeing.
Thanks, I say. And then I take another shot and miss
and LaTenya laughs
Guess they can’t see the basket so good though, huh?
she says.
But she’s only joking.
Then she leans against the school yard fence
and I take a few more shots
and they go in
Swish. Swish. Swish.
I want to say I found God, Lili.
And throw up my hands.
And grin like somebody’s big old fool.
POETRY POEM
You don’t just get to write a poem once
You gotta write it over and over and over
until it feels real good to you
And sometimes it does
and sometimes it doesn’t
That’s what’s really great
and really stupid
about poetry.
ERIC POEM
Lamont comes back on Monday morning
but Eric doesn’t
Ms. Marcus stands up in front of the class and coughs.
Not a real cough. The kind of cough
grown-ups get when they’d rather not
be talking to you.
The tall lady from the agency gets that cough
when I ask her if me and Lili ever gonna live
together again.
Ms. Marcus says I have some sad news
Eric is in the hospital.
She says he has a disease
and some of his cells are shaped funny.
And sometimes, she says, that makes his life very painful.
Can you catch it from him? Angel asks, looking scared.
’Cause me and him was hanging a lot and I don’t want
no disease.
No, Ms. Marcus says. It’s not contagious.
She draws a shape on the board.
Does anybody know what a sickle is, she says.
Nobody raises their hand.
I know what a sickle is. Slaves used it to cut
sugarcane and stuff.
I know a lot of other kids know too
but our minds are busy wrapping themselves around
Eric
and all the pain in his body and how
we never knew he had no disease.
Ms. Marcus explains what a sickle is.
Then she says, Eric has sickle-cell anemia.
She coughs again and says
It’s a disease that’s common . . .
She stops talking
looks around the room for a minute
then she kind of whispers
among African Americans.
There’s six Puerto Ricans in our class—
Manny, Lourdes, Jillian,
Samantha, Carlos, and Sophia.
There’s two Dominicans—Angel and Maritza.
Gina and Cara are from Trinidad and
Guy is from Jamaica.
All the rest of us are from right here.
All the rest of us are African American.
Everyone looks around the room at everybody else.
Do you die with that, Lamont wants to know.
Not directly, Ms. Marcus says. But she doesn’t explain
and nobody asks any more questions about dying.
How long they gonna keep him
in the hospital? Somebody else wants to know.
I don’t know, Ms. Marcus says.
His mother doesn’t know yet, Ms. Marcus says.
Let’s hope not long though, Ms. Marcus says.
Ms. Marcus says.
Ms. Marcus says.
Ms. Marcus says and the words circle
round the room, bounce off the walls
keep zooming
past my head.
Zip! Zap!
Like they’re banging against it.
I thought, Ms. Marcus says
we could make him a card.
I take a deep breath and put my head down on my
desk.
I try not to think of Eric’s angel voice singing in
church.
I try not to think of us shooting hoops together at
lunchtime.
My throat feels all choky though anyway.
My whole body feels bent out of shape and strange.
The last time Miss Edna came home and found me
crying she said Think
about all the stuff you love, Lonnie.
Let those things fill your head.
Popsicle
Icicle
Bicycle
Sickle cell.
Popsicle
Icicle
Bicycle
Sickle cell.
LAMONT
Lamont comes in mad on Wednesday.
Ms. Marcus makes believe she doesn’t see him sitting
over there with his arms folded,
his face all scrunched up staring out the window, his
back the only thing facing front.
Let’s take out our poetry notebooks, Ms. Marcus says.
I want to work on haiku again today.
I don’t like forms. I like free verse when you can write
anything you want
any way you want but Ms. Marcus says
there’s a time for form and a time for free verse
which I think is a stupid, very teacher thing to say.
I ain’t writing no poetry, Lamont says. No black guys be
writing poetry anyway.
I already have my poetry notebook open but I close it
real fast.
What about Richard Wright, Ms. Marcus says. And
Langston Hughes.
Angel says I know Richard Wright. He lives on my block.
His mom’s name’s Mrs. Wright.
I know Langston Hughes too, Angel says.
I see a little smile on Lamont’s face but he’s still
sitting turned away
from the whole class.
Both of them died a long time ago, Ms. Marcus says. But
she’s kinda smiling too.
How’s he gonna be dead and still live on my block? Angel
wants to know.
He gives Ms. Marcus a look like she’s lost her mind.
Pablo died, Angel says. He got shot by somebody last
year. But not Richard.
Richard Wright was right there playing basketball last
Saturday. He could slam-dunk.
But the rim’s bent so it don’t really count.
Richard Wright—the poet—Ms. Marcus says
wrote haiku. Langston Hughes—the poet—wrote all kinds
of poetry.
Richard Wright also wrote novels.
Whole books? I ask. I didn’t know poets could write
whole stories.
Whole books, Ms. Marcus says.
Lamont doesn’t say anything but I see his head turning
front a little bit.
He make a lot of money? Angel wants to know.
Ms. Marcus picks up a book off of her desk.
He wrote because he loved writing, she said.
That’s what matters.
Not if you broke, Angel says. The whole class laughs.
Even Lamont.
But he looks over where Eric’s empty chair is and then
he st
ops laughing real fast.
Do you think poor people aren’t happy? Ms. Marcus says.
Angel shrugs. I don’t know. Don’t know any poor people.
But when you see those pictures on TV of those kids who
they want you to send money to,
they don’t look happy to me.
They just look hungry and sad.
Ms. Marcus doesn’t say anything. She looks stuck.
Real stuck and I feel
kinda sorry for her.
Let’s take out our poetry notebooks, she says again.
Everybody but Lamont takes out their notebooks and
just sort of stares down at them.
Ms. Marcus sits down at her desk.
She lets out a deep breath
pushes her hair away from her face
looks out at all thirty-two of us
shakes her head.
And for a long, long time just stares
down at her hands.
HIP HOP RULES THE WORLD
Hip Hop Rules the World, Lamont said
grinning like somebody had told him
he’d just won the lotto.
But all it was was Ms. Marcus saying
Of course rap is poetry!
One of the most creative forms.
So now Lamont’s writing lyrics
and bopping his head
and every chance he gets
saying
Hip Hop Rules the World
and
It’s one of the most creative forms
and
Hey Dog! Guess who else is a poet now!
PHOTOGRAPHS
There’s two of me and Lili.
We were little then, dressed up at Easter time
Big smiles—me with two front teeth missing
and my head shaved Easter clean.
Here’s Mama and Daddy dancing,
Mama’s blurry foot lifted up in the air.
Look how she’s laughing.
When I look at the picture I can hear it.
Here’s the four of us
Everybody smiling at the camera but
me. I’m looking away from it
frowning
Like I see something coming
that ain’t good.
NEW BOY POEM III
He says My name is
Clyde not New Boy, not Country,
not Straw Head Cotton-Picker Dirt-Eater Bumpkin.
Just Clyde. Easy to say. Easy to remember.
Why don’t soma y’all try to use it sometime.
After all, he says
I thought city people was supposed to be smart.
HAPPINESS POEM
This afternoon I come home to find
Miss Edna dancing with the broom
The broom’s swishing across the floor and Miss Edna
got a tight hold on its blue handle and singing
along with the radio. She’s kind
of soft-shoeing the poor broom back and forth
across the kitchen floor like her mind
is gone. That’s what I’m thinking, praying
Please Lord don’t let Miss Edna’s mind be gone
’cause I was just getting used to living here
Please Lord me and her don’t always get along but
she’s all I got right now when Miss Edna turns
to me with the biggest smile I seen in a long time
and says My Rodney is coming for Easter
My Rodney is bringing himself on home for a while
Then she’s swish-swishing off again with me
just standing there feeling the relief lift me up and
set me right back down in Miss Edna’s kitchen again.
BIRTH
When I was born I didn’t even
weigh four pounds, Mama used to tell me.
See this chicken I’m about to cut up and fry?
You were even smaller than it. Doctors said
there’s a little bit we can do but mostly you
have to hope hard
and pray.
Mama cut the wing off the chicken, rinsed
it under the faucet, patted it dry—real gentle
like she was deep remembering.
So I hoped and prayed and sat by that tiny
baby every hour of every day for weeks
and more weeks. Doctors said it’s his lungs,
they’re just not ready for the world yet. Can’t
take a breath in. Can’t let one out. So I breathed
for you, trying to show you how, I
prayed to those lungs, Mama said. Grow!
The chicken was cut up, spiced up, dipped
in flour and ready to fry. Mama touched each piece
still real gentle before she slipped it into the hot
oil. Then you were four pounds, five pounds, six pounds
bigger than this chicken. My big little baby boy
not even two months old and already
a survivor.
LILI’S NEW MAMA’S HOUSE
The #52 bus takes a long time coming and even though
it’s the first day of spring it’s still a little cold so when
the #69 comes real fast, I think That’s God. And when
the heat’s turned up real high inside the bus and I
ain’t shivering no more, I think That’s God too.
And then I’m walking the blocks to Lili’s new mama’s
house and when I get there, I see Lili standing at the
window waving and grinning and I think
There’s God.
Lili’s new mama lives on a pretty block with trees and
brownstone houses that all look alike so if you don’t
know the address you end up knocking on a stranger’s
door even if you been there a couple of times before.
Now I know Lili’s mama’s house is the one with yellow
curtains on the second floor and, most times, with Lili
in the window.
We sit in the living room. It smells like lemon and Lili
says, “That’s what we clean the floor with.” The floors
are made of wood and there’s pretty rugs in different
spots. Not a whole lot of furniture but enough to find
a nice place to sit. I don’t lean back though cause Lili’s
new mama will give me a look. There’s chocolate chip
cookies and two glasses of milk on the coffee table.
I take one cookie and eat it real slow even though I
want to take a whole bunch at one time. Then I take
a little sip of milk and make sure to set my glass back
down on the coaster thing ’cause I know Lili’s new
mama is watching me from the kitchen. There’s bright
sun coming in through the big windows and the house
is like this yellow-gold color and warm. Even though
Lili’s new mama doesn’t like me, I’m glad that my sister
has such a nice place to sleep at night. And I’m glad
she has a nice room to sit in and eat chocolate chip
cookies and drink milk outa blue glasses that make
you think of nights up on the roof in the summertime.
God’s in this room, I whisper to Lili.
She looks at me a minute without saying anything.
Then she smiles.
God is everywhere, I say.
And with the sun coming in the room that way
and my sister smiling so big and the plate
of cookies there if you want them, just take one
at a time and chew it slow
I feel Him, right there beside us.
CHURCH
On Sundays, the preacher gives everyone a chance
to repent their sins. Miss Edna makes me go
to church. She wears a bright hat
I wear my suit. Babies dress in lace.
G
irls my age, some pretty, some not so
pretty. Old ladies and men nodding.
Miss Edna every now and then throwing her hand
in the air. Saying Yes, Lord and Preach!
I sneak a pen from my back pocket,
bend down low like I dropped something.
The chorus marches up behind the preacher
clapping and humming and getting ready to sing.
I write the word HOPE on my hand.
NEW BOY POEM IV
Takes the soccer ball
around the school yard eight times
His feet are magic.
TEACHER OF THE YEAR
The news people from Channel 7 Eyewitness
News came to our school. ’Cause guess what?
Ms. Marcus is the Teacher of the Year.
Ms. Marcus smiling all proud brought them
right into our classroom and we all crowded
around the cameras, pulling at the mikes, making
faces into the camera, getting into trouble.
Me and Angel was standing together and we
heard the newsman talking to Ms. Marcus about
inner-city and underserved and Angel looked at me
That’s the nice way of saying poor, he said.
What poor person’s daddy can afford to buy him
hundred-dollar kicks? He held up his foot to the camera
showing off his new sneaker. The newsman heard
him. He put the mike in Angel’s face and said
Tell me about this man.
He don’t live with us, Angel said, but he comes every