by Nikki Grimes
“So. You finally went out with him,” said Janelle.
“Yeah.”
“Well?”
“Well what?” I bite my tongue to keep from laughing. I know this is killing her.
“What did you and Latin Loverboy do?”
“We went to a movie.”
“And?”
“And what? We watched it and he took me home.”
“And?”
“And nothing. Now, can we please get to work?”
“Girl, you are no fun anymore. All you want to do is work, work, work.”
“Yeah, well, fun ain’t going to get me through history or trig.”
Janelle stuck her tongue out at me and cracked open her history book, looking all disappointed. I balled up a piece of paper and threw it at her. She looked up, surprised, and threw it back, laughing. Then we settled down.
It’s great having somebody to study with, even though I do okay on my own. Mr. Ward says if I keep pulling up all my other grades the way I’ve pulled up my grade in English, I should be able to get into a decent college when I graduate. That’s what I’m planning on.
I want to go somewhere out of state, somewhere away from home, away from Berto and his drinking buddies. I’ll miss my sister, Christina, and her little Rosa, though. But I don’t see them as much as I used to, anyway. I’m too busy with school.
I’m not sure what I want to major in at college. I know I want to do something with kids, though. Maybe become a kindergarten teacher, or a pediatrician. Gloria says I still got time to figure that out. Keeping my grades up so I can get into a good school—that’s the main thing.
Christina says I’m the smart one. “I envy you, Lupe,” she told me last night. I could hardly believe my ears. “I wish I had gone to college,” she said.
Getting to college takes more than wishing, I can tell you that much.
I’ve got an exam tomorrow, so I better put in an extra hour of study. I don’t know what the questions are going to be, but I want to make sure I’m ready for whatever they throw at me.
OPEN MIKE
imagine
BY LUPE ALGARIN
I walk by a mirror,
catch my eye,
wonder at the universe
behind it.
Past the flashing eyes
is a file
for yesterday’s sunset
dripping mango light,
for Papi’s laughter
tinkling in my
five-year-old ears
so many years gone by,
for tears
shed below a crucifix
on my wall.
I sort it all out,
store it under
“been there, done that”
and open a clean drawer
labeled Mañana,
a place to store adventures
I’m still learning
to imagine.
Tyrone
Something’s different about Lupe’s voice. It’s still soft, but it’s like there’s steel running through it now. I don’t think I’m making that up. Anyway, I know one thing for sure. I don’t catch her staring off the way I used to. She’s always looking straight up now, paying attention to whatever the teacher is saying, like she’s afraid to miss a word. I see her running off to the library a lot lately too. Something new is definitely up with that girl.
Diondra
It was an accident. I didn’t mean to leave them out for my father to find. At least, I don’t think I did. That’s what I told Lupe when she asked me what was wrong this morning. I was still upset about my father throwing a fit when he found my art school brochures last night. You’d think I’d stabbed him in the heart, the way he looked at me.
I’m sorry he feels so bad, but there’s nothing I can do about it. I’ve made up my mind. If I can get into an art school, I’m going. Mr. Ward thinks I have a good chance of getting a scholarship. We’ll see. Mom says my dad will come around. Eventually. I’m not so sure. Before I left home today, I slipped a poem and a drawing of Michael Jordan in my father’s easy chair, under the remote. That way, he wouldn’t miss them. I was planning to give him the drawing for his birthday, but after seeing those brochures, he looked like he needed a transfusion, so why wait? Maybe a drawing of his hero will make him feel better. Besides, doing basketball portraits is the closest I’ll ever get to my father’s dreams for me, so I might as well let him enjoy one now.
I hope Mom’s right, though. I hope he does come around. I’m just not holding my breath.
OPEN MIKE
Self-Portrait : A Poem for My Father
BY DIONDRA JORDAN
I’ve told you this before
but I guess it bears repeating.
Love is not me being
who you want.
Your definition
is a whirlpool
trying to suck me in
and I’m drowning.
Don’t you see?
Don’t you hear?
I’m gurgling,
battling for air,
wishing you cared about
what matters to me.
But you can’t,
or won’t.
Either way, I dip into
my imagination,
grab a rail
and pull myself free.
It’s time, Dad.
Time you stop telling me
who to be,
how to live.
This is my portrait.
You chose your canvas.
Let me choose mine.
Tyrone
I didn’t get her first few poems, but I dig this one.
The future is ours. Let us have it. That’s what she’s saying. That’s what we’re all saying. But I’m lucky. These days my moms ain’t trying to push me in one direction or another. She’s just glad I have one.
I read her this poem I wrote called “Dream” about doing hip-hop with my own band, and she started crying. My moms don’t cry easy, so I felt bad. But she said they were happy tears. “You keep writing, baby,” she said. “You’re doing good.”
I love my moms.
Porscha Johnson
I slam my lunch tray down on the table across from Leslie and Chankara. Diondra looks up, startled, from the next table, then turns back to her lasagna.
“The minute I turn twenty-one, I’m changing my name,” I say to no one in particular. “I mean it.”
“Why wait?” says Chankara. We’ve had this conversation before. “Why not change it now?”
I shake my head. “Too complicated.”
“Fine, then. Count to ten, and try this.” She slices off a square of pizza from her plate and shoves it in my mouth.
Chankara’s a problem solver. She has no patience for talking a thing to death. Do something about it or shut up is her motto. I guess she’s right. But one of these days, the name Porscha will have to go. I’m tired of providing oversized boys with the raw material for adolescent jokes about my being a high-maintenance mama, or some sort of luxury item. Then there are those oily, leering, dirty old men on my block who drool or wink at me when I pass by on my way home, asking if they can take me for a test drive. Please. But for now, I’m stuck with Porscha. I can live with it a while longer, though.
It’s amazing how easy it is to get a bad reputation. My whole life, I ran around letting people pick on me, laughing it off when they teased me, fast-talking my way out of fights. They’d call me four eyes, or stuck-up, or Miss Bug-eyed Bookworm, and I’d pretend their words were water and let them roll off of my back. Now, I’m nobody’s duck, and their words stung a whole lot more than water, but I held my temper. It took a bully nine straight months of riding me to cause my thermometer to boil. And once I lost it, did anybody blame it on the bully? No. They start calling me crazy, whispering it behind my back. It was as if that other Porscha, the easygoing, even-tempered one, never existed. Truth is, she always did, always will.
Diondra and Chankara know th
at. And now, so does Leslie. If only the other kids knew the truth. I could never beat anybody the way I beat Charmayne last year. I’d be afraid to. What if I couldn’t stop? What if there was no one around to pull me off? I could kill somebody. I know it’s in me. I’ve got Mama’s blood running in my veins, haven’t I? She came close enough to killing me, more than once.
When I was twelve, she went on one of her tears and punched me from one side of the room to the other because I didn’t wash the dishes. I don’t think that was the real reason, though. She was probably just stressed out from working overtime, from dealing with a hard-to-please new boss, or from juggling bills, and I caught the hard end of it. But who cares about the real reasons? The thing is, the same kind of ugly anger lives in me. I couldn’t really see that until Charmayne brought it out. I have to make sure that monster never shows her face again, no matter what.
So I find ways to keep her in check. When anger rips a hole in me now, I punch a wall, or run ’til the wind cuts my breath off. Once, I sat on a curb running a piece of broken bottle across my fingertips. Lucky for me the shard had a dull edge that left a jigsaw of scratches on me, but not a whole lot of blood. I know it was a stupid thing to do, but anything’s better than allowing those fingers to hurt somebody else. I couldn’t live with that. Not again. Not ever.
No, these kids have nothing to fear from me. They just don’t know it.
Leslie says I’ve got to learn to let people in, and I know she’s right. Poetry just may be a way to do that. I mean, it worked for Devon, didn’t it? And Tyrone. We all got to see another side of them. Even Janelle gets up there—Miss Shyness herself! I’ve never seen her turn so bold, although the boldness only seems to last as long as she’s up front reading her poems. Still, that’s something. Tyrone was the biggest surprise, though. Who would have guessed he wrote poetry? And he knows his poems by heart, no less.
Every Friday there he is, the first one to raise his hand when Mr. Ward asks who’s got something they want to read. And he’s always the first one up, if Mr. Ward gives him the chance. No goofing around like he usually does either. He’s all business. He takes center stage, clears his throat, and smoothly launches into his rhyme.
The first time he got up there, I rolled my eyes like half the sisters in class, certain he was going to spout something lame or nasty about girls and sex, or gangsters. I mean, that’s all we ever heard him talk about, right? But there was nothing lame about this poem, and none of it was about sex. It was about what’s going on in the world, and about trying to make sense of it. It was a poem by somebody who really thinks about things, and that somebody turned out to be Tyrone. He made me change my mind about him that day. Maybe I can change people’s minds about me too. It’s worth a shot. I better do it quick, though. There are only a few Open Mike Fridays left before school’s out, and the last one will be at assembly, and I don’t plan on getting up in front of a whole group of strangers my first time out.
Friday is two days away, and I know exactly what poem I’m going to read.
OPEN MIKE
A Letter to My Mother
BY PORSCHA JOHNSON
Dear Mom,
You with the hypodermic needle in your arm,
I never said good-bye, or joined your funeral procession
because I was too angry at the time.
Leaving me seemed to be your choice.
Why make it? Was it something that I did or said?
Weeks after you were dead, those questions
hammered me until I thought my heart would shatter.
But then, as my friend told me, the why of your absence
doesn’t really matter. Besides, I’m older now
and understand a little about pain, and the crazy things
it drives us to. So, even though this may be overdue
(remember: Some things are better late than never)—
Mom, I finally forgive you.
Love,
Porscha.
P.S.
Good-bye.
Tyrone
Now I know school’s almost over. We came to our English class yesterday and found our poems and drawings gone from the wall. Porscha was about to freak, along with everybody else, ’til Mr. Ward surprised us with a class anthology. He’d gone to some quick-copy place and made up books for each of us with copies of our work. It was pretty cool the way he hooked it up. I can’t wait to show my moms.
It was kinda sad seeing the walls all bare. But hey, today was our last Open Mike Friday, so it was time for our stuff to come down. Besides, we were only in there long enough to take attendance. Then we headed for the auditorium to have Open Mike there as part of assembly, just like Mr. Ward planned.
The hall was crowded by the time I got there. I looked around for that reporter, but I don’t think he made it. Yeah, well, I thought. His loss.
I slipped into a seat in the front row just as the principal called everybody to attention. Sitting up front ain’t my thing, but this assembly was different. Our whole class was there so we could reach the stage quicker to read our work. I was down with that.
The principal made a couple of announcements, but don’t ask me about what. Nobody was interested. We all sat up, though, when he called Teach to the stage.
Mr. Ward explained what Open Mike Friday was about and how we got started. (Wesley yelling, “Y‘all got me to thank! Remember that!”) I was only half listening ’cause I was waiting ’til Teach got to the good stuff, meaning when we finally got to read.
“Before we get started,” he said, “I thought it would be good if one or two of the students who have participated in Open Mike this year would say a few words about what it has meant to them.” I checked down the row real quick.
“I’ll pass,” said Leslie.
Amy and Sheila had “Don’t look at me” stamped all over their faces. Raul didn’t look much better.
Sterling rose outta his seat, but then sat back down. Cracked me up. Everybody was suddenly shy. Not me. I stood, headed for the podium.
I cleared my throat, rolled my shoulders a few times to get relaxed.
“Today, Tyrone,” said Mr. Ward.
“Yeah, my brotha,” chimed in Porscha.
“I’m getting there,” I said, taking a second to adjust the microphone. “Hello? Can you hear me?”
“Yeah, fool, but you ain’t saying nothing,” said Chankara.
“Aiight. Just give me a minute.” Everybody laughed.
“Okay. I just wanted to say I’m really glad I got to do this poetry thing because I feel like, even though the people in our class are all different colors and some of you speak a different language and everything, I feel like we connected. I feel like I know you now. You know what I’m saying? I feel like we’re not as different as I thought.”
I looked out at Raul, Janelle, Gloria, Devon, my homey Wesley—my whole crew—and felt something deep inside my chest, something that made me swallow hard.
“You guys are okay,” I said. “Even you, Steve, with your skinny, bleach-blond self.” Steve grinned. Raynard patted him on the back and everybody else tee-heed for a hot second. Then I went back to my seat.
When I sat down, our whole crew was clapping. Tanisha and Judianne whistled. Nobody said it, but it was like I had spoken for all of us. You know what I’m saying? And that don’t happen every day.
I’m glad I didn’t choke up there, ’cause now the whole school’s talking about that assembly. Probably be talking about it all summer, we was so hot. We sizzled! Chankara read, Raul did his Zorro thing, my man Wesley and me did a new cipher with a little sax from Raynard, and I even got Porscha to read her piece again. I never did come up with any African drum music for Tanisha, but the sista did fine all by herself.
Except for Wesley and me, we all pretty much did our old poems. The kids in our class were the only ones who’d already heard them. Besides, most of the kids want to wait ‘til next year to break out the new stuff, ’cause Mr. Ward already told us he pl
ans to have Open Mike in all his classes then. Cool, huh?
After assembly, Mr. Ward came up and clapped me on the back. “I like what you had to say, Tyrone. And I loved your cipher,” he told me. “Any chance I’ll see you next year?”
“I don’t know, Mr. Ward,” I said. “I’ve been thinking about hooking up with some guys who want to start a band. I might have to skip school and go on tour, you know what I’m saying? So I can’t make no promises.” I’m blowing smoke about this tour and Teach knows it, but that’s the game.
“I understand. But I did want to let you know, we’ll be hosting a poetry slam here next year,” said Mr. Ward.
And guess what. All of a sudden, the man’s got my attention.
Epilogue
My mother says I’m lucky. She thinks I should be thrilled to go to an American school every day. I pretend I’m happy, for her sake. She doesn’t understand what it’s like for me. Nobody does.
My name is Mai Tren. I’m half Black, half Vietnamese. You try being me for a week, see how well you fit into this world. “Go back where you came from,” kids say to me sometimes. And I think, Go where exactly? We left the village my mother grew up in many years ago, right after my father died. He was American, so my mother was able to bring our family to the United States. I have as much right to be here as anyone. But no one hears me. No one cares about that. They can’t see past my slanted eyes. Not even the Black kids. Never mind that we’re all people of color, that most of us live in single-parent homes, that we catch the same amount of grief from the white world. It’s ridiculous.
I’ll be all right, though. I’ll finish high school, go to college, get my law degree, and be out of here. I just can’t count on having too many friends along the way.