You're so sweet!
This poem chokes me up! Something that has frustrated me to no end, and one reason I joined a multicultural sorority, is that truly, you can never understand where someone else is coming from. I want to know so I can experience someone else's joys and sorrows. But, it's almost like I'm jealous, not so much that I'm not happy with who I am, just that I envy people who experience the world differently from me. I hate that I can't jump into someone else's shoes in reality!! Does anyone know what I'm talking about?
Nikki Giovanni's poem entitled
"Nikki-Rosa" is incredible. Take a moment to read it and really understand what she's saying:
childhood remembrances are always a drag
if you’re Black
you always remember things like living in Woodlawn
with no inside toilet
and if you become famous or something
they never talk about how happy you were to have your mother
all to yourself and
how good the water felt when you got your bath from one of those big tubs that folk in Chicago barbecue in
and somehow when you talk about home
it never gets across how much you
understood their feelings
as the whole family attended meetings about Hollydale
and even though you remember
your biographers never understand
your father’s pain as he sells his stock
and another dream goes
and though you’re poor it isn’t poverty that
concerns you
and though they fight a lot
it isn’t your father’s drinking that makes any difference
but only that everybody is together and you
and your sister have happy birthdays and very good
Christmases
and I really hope no white person ever has cause to write about me
because they never understand that Black love is Black wealth and they’ll
probably talk about my hard childhood and never understand that
all the while I was quite happy.
I'm also one of those crazy people who wants to know what it feels like to get shot. I was stabbed as a child by my brother. It was an accident, but at least I know what it's like.
preciousjeni