The Art of Growing in Purposeful Silence

T here is nothing wrong with us. There is something wrong with thinking there is something wrong with us. View Video Johns Hopkins University. 2010. I did not want to "sound dumb" in front of "them." No confidence in my ability to articulate myself. Inadvertent lessons learned by way of my grandma cursing me out one minute and answering a random phone call with her "high-class" tone the next, taught me that there was only one way to "sound" intelligent. So, before my very first graduate school presentation, I spent hours in the mirror, annunciating my words to mimic the intonation and cadences of "their" accents. Here I was, earning straight A's on every one of my written assignments, a well versed scholar, adept in my content but still, not enough.  Writing this to clarify the intended message of my last post. My students are EXPECTED TO SPEAK/WRITE STANDARD ENGLISH in my classroom, PERIOD. However, I d

No more. In a society that continues to herald the infamy of our communities by brainwashing mass audiences through media that depicts our 'hoods as wild and dangerous, we say, no more. It's as if the hood is synonymous to the jungle. But wouldn't we ALL, not just those of us who are "woke" but all! of us, have to mentally and financially be freed in order for us to be akin to the creatures in the jungle? Are we America's zoo animals? Socially and economically, caged and marginalized by the control of "their" meticulously allocated resources. The direct result of systemic redlining by the various housing acts and the big banks of America, positioned our neighborhoods to be doomed. With no jobs in the early to mid-nineteen-hundreds for many of our youth, they took to the streets. Convinced that drug money was going to save our souls, when in actuality it created an even bigger market for us "zoo birds" to become domesticated "jail birds

when im riding my bike under the full moon i ask my great grandma, whom only i can see, why? why you start this? why you leave your babies when they was only babies? "embarrassment," the wind whispers to me through dead autumn leaves. "the voices, the blue eyed ghosts, the light skinned long haired singing girls who never let me even hum their pretty little tunes. the promise of hard labor. the regret of being alive.  i wanted freedom.  i wanted to die but instead i chose to run.  the south was no place for me.  the south was for mamas and yes, i had 6 babies but i was never a mama.  and i knew this so i ran.  i never slept.  i never slept alone.  kept my bed filled.  kept my distance from the truth.  kept my lace-veiled hat cocked to side covering the tears that fell on Sunday mornings because i missed what i could have had  and when it came to me... when my babies came to me,  all grown and tall,  i spat at them instead of saying sorry but i promis