I don't seek justice, I stalk it - Misty Knight
Misty Knight,
You walked into Cottonmouth’s wannabe Cotton Club in a low cut blue dress with curls that defied gravity, and a smile that said ‘I know something you don’t know.’ I knew from there you’d be trouble, that you’d steal my heart.
See, as a comic girl and a superhero movie enthusiast, I didn’t realise how starved, how thirsty (as the kids say now-a-days) I was for someone like you to show up on my screen. How anxious I was to see a brown girl on the screen. I had Storm’s Halle Berry as a kid, but between me and you, she just wasn’t enough. She always played second fiddle to Hugh Jackman’s overdone Wolverine; two lines away from being nothing more than a wall fixture.
You came in like hurricane. Sensuality and sexual agency on display. Too often the Black woman’s body is co-opted and denigrated; taken apart and tried on like a costume. But you - you stood tall - confident - deep brown skin glistening, dark brown eyes bright. A coy smile, a coquettish smirk. Maya Angelou came to mind, “Pretty women wonder where my secrets lie….”
It was love at first sight.
And as I watched you from one episode to the next, enamoured is the only way I can possibly describe my emotional state.
Your drive. Your passion. Your dedication. Your heart.
A Black female cop protecting her down, but not out, city? A cop who knows what the law should be? One who struggles under the weight of being both Black and blue?
(A multifaceted Black Woman on my screen not in a Shonda Rhimes show?)
I watched as you clipped your police badge to your belt and clouded yourself in capability, but refused to be bound by the ‘strong black woman’ cliché that’s limited the verisimilitude of so many women before you. You allowed yourself to break, to let the stress and weight of the job get to you. You broke for Scarfe - your long time partner and dirty cop. You broke for Pop - community glue and casualty of the crime you fought.
Most of all, you broke for yourself. As a Black woman, you knew the innate tensions between the community you came from and the one that you’d adopted as your own. Community policing of people of color, particularly those of Latinx and Black origins in the inner city have since the dawn of policing been tense at best. You knew the minefield you walked in the name of Justice - the smoke screens and red tape; racially coded laws and unofficial official policies designed to keep communities like ours underneath lock and key.
Yet, somehow, your commitment to justice - real justice where the bad guy (or girl in your case) gets what they deserve - never wavered. Your resolve strengthened, even when you lost.
Streetwise.
Capable.
Vulnerable.
Intelligent.
Beautiful.
Screw Luke Cage, Daredevil, Jessica Jones and whoever else dons the superhero mantel. Without a cape, and coming in at just above the average height of 5’5, you - Misty Knight - are the hero that we, in the age of #BlackLivesMatter and #BlackGirlsAreMagic, deserve.
Love,
An enamoured Black girl
