This piece is my original spoken word/narrative of the events regarding police violence against black men, women and children in recent and past years. My hope is that my piece will inform people of the issues prevailing our world. Read, be moved, share.
“Lift every voice and sing
Till earth and heaven ring
Ring with the harmonies, Of Liberty
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies
Let it resound, loud as the roaring seas”
We sang this song when we heard the news. We didn’t know him personally, none of us did, but we felt it. We felt the bang, as it rang when that shot pierced through the air. We heard the screams, from the mother who would never see her baby walk again. We tasted the salt, of the tears from the father whose name would live on no more. We felt the fear; the fear of the children who once giggled down that very street. And we heard the final gasp, of that young boy, not a year older than we. And we felt it. We had lost one of our own.
We had lost a brother.
So we gathered in that church that day, we cried, and we sang and we prayed. And we got used to that. Because after him, this became the norm.
Shortly after it became a trend, brother here, son there, uncles, cousins, nephews, husbands, one down after the other, “Hands up, don’t shoot!” Bang.
What have we become?
Racism- R-A-C-I-S-M,
Racism (noun)
- Prejudice, or discrimination directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior.
1
It didn’t take me long to realize that this was something I’d hear about nearly every week. The whole idea of murder seemed more real and closer to home than it ever had before. The idea of being killed or beaten because of my skin? Let me know if you see shock on this face.
2
Ezell Ford, 25, beaten and shot, Darrien Hunt, six shots to the back, “looked suspicious." Omar Abrego, father of three beaten to death. Tamir E Rice,12, shot to death, “looked suspicious.” Tanisha Anderson, 37, slammed to the ground, killed, “disturbing the peace.”
What is peace?
3
I came to know my church very well. It seemed that every other day we were gathered in there, praying. I can’t remember if I was praying for the violence to end or asking God when the next brother would go down so I could prepare myself. Praying to him that I my brother’s would be safe. It got to the point where I never let my brother walk alone. “Don’t put up your hood," I would tell him. I would tense up if a police car even got a block away from us, even if he never did anything wrong. He never did anything wrong.
He didn’t need to.
4
Don’t put up your hood
5
I don’t care if it’s cold.
6
I began to keep a binder of the lost brother, sisters, husbands and sons in that summer of 2014 alone. By week three my binder was nearly full. A scrapbook of reminders that the world is yet to change.
7
A racist picture emerged through a public Jersey high school. Four boys, two hoods, a black dummy lynched from a pole. The people defended them.
Rumain Brisbon, His pill bottle looked like a gun. Oops.
“They didn’t mean it,” they said.
John Crawford the third- Buying BB gun in Walmart for his children
“I’m sure the boys are sorry,” they said.
Keith Vidal, 18, schizophrenic and having an episode.
Officer's last words:
“We don’t have time for this.”
Akia Gurley, Walking down the stairs. Looked suspicious. “It was an accident.”
We can’t explain the hoods, some people said. It was just boys being boys.
8
Eric Garner, selling cigarettes, asthmatic. Forced to the ground.
“I can’t breathe.”
Michael Brown, walking down the street, matching the description of a suspect. Description? Black male.
“I can’t breathe.”
Witnesses say Brown’s hands were up as he ran from the officer.
“I CAN’T BREATHE.”
His body was left on the ground for more than four hours.
“HE CAN’T BREATHE.”
Michelle Cusseaux
Jason Harrison
Yvette Smith
THEY AREN’T BREATHING.
9
I speak out for minority rights at my convention.
10
A old man brings along his flag.
11
He calls me a...
12
June 17, 2015 A group of people go to church for a prayer service.
Nine never return home.
13
The shooter regrets nothing.
14
My binder was full and I felt sick. Sick because I was seeing what the world I live in was becoming, and I hated it. Despised it. Wanted to shrink into my skin forever. For I finally understood that when most people see my skin my body is replaced with words. Loud. Angry. Ghetto. Thing. Problem. Thug. Target. From my own neighbors calling the police on my family for seeming suspicious, to the daily horrors on the news channels. These shootings brought unrest to my community, and a divide throughout the world. I no longer felt safe in my skin and no longer felt comfortable in many situations. I felt as though the color of my skin made people perceive me as, “less than.”
So I started mic nights, where myself and other students in my community voice our opinions on these situations through performances and film. I met with leaders of the Lehigh Valley and started a multicultural organization where we offered counsel to students affected by all that was going on. The number of students was heartbreaking. This eased the tension among these terrified teens, but my mind continued to go back to the original problem: that racism is here and won’t be gone for a while. These shootings, altercations, arrests, they don’t cease with open mics. They don’t end with this speech. They won’t stop as mother’s cry and father’s die while sons comply to this system. Something more needs to be done, but it is only with the will of everyone that change will ever take place. It is only by informing everyone, young and old, that events like these exist and are happening in our world that change willever take place. All I ask is that you hear the way these events affect us, and remember that pain when another boy’s name goes in that notebook.
15
If 15 seconds is the average amount of time after a victim raises their hands in surrender before they will be shot, how long will it take the world to hear the bullet?
