concrete kids
For Harlem & its angelsThis is for the concrete kids. The kids with a melanin kiss. The kids drenched in poverty. The kids who are told to cut their hair, to tame their tone. The kids who are told to shorten their names and disappear their tongues. The kids who are told they will amount to nothing. The smart kids who are told they are problematic. The problematic kids who are told they are stupid. The kids who are taking care of their families in between extracurriculars. The kids who cannot go to extracurriculars because they are taking care of their families. The stoop kids. The hungry kids. The thirsty kids. The foster kids. The kids who aged out of the system. The missing kids. The homeless kids. The kids in jail. The kids awaiting trial. The innocent kids. The kids who never got to be kids. The kids navigating the violence of hands. The kids who are being taught to fear themselves. The kids who refuse. The kids in gangs. The kids thinking about joining gangs. The kids who started them. The adults they became. The adults who wait for the blood to dry out in the sun with the laundry.
The kids who bury the adults.
The adults who bury the kids.
The angels they became.
The angels they will become.
More specifically—this is for the boy in the white tee and the breath I saw escape him.
gardeniasThe thing about things that drown
Is that they never learn to breathe right
No one ever told them
Of a life
Without strain
A constant choking
Begging for permission
To remain
Limbless in limbo
Calling on the Good Lord
For some ease
A terrifying permission
Comes with youth
The way our bodies
Selflessly unfold
Before the altar
A sacred celebration
Of gardenias in bloom
Eden welcoming the ruin
I was born somewhere in New York City on May 15, 1992.
I do not know the time of day or recall the scent of birth, but I am sure I arrived screaming like everyone else.
pigmentAll of me is brown
My eyes, my hair
My skin
I do not know My father
The source is a figment
of melanin of imagination
I have never met him
Barbie looks like my mother
Who does not look like me
Blond hair blue eyes
And a White body
My reflection
Betrays easily
As I yearn
for pieces of her
To stare back at me
there is love
there is love
there is love
there is questioning
There are no Black Barbies
My mother hand paints
them brown
I do not know
If this makes me
Feel better
There’s no way to
Fabricate reality
So we might as well
Let barbie be
Barbie
kelly be Kelly
& ken be Ken
I do not
Need to
Be White
Like her, like them
To love the skin
That I am in
Copyright © 2020 by Amyra León; Illustrated by Ashley Lukashevsky. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
