I want to be Nikki Giovanni bad
I want to be Nikki Giovanni BAD,
Ego Trippin’ to my own magnificence
Kidnapped By a Poem and taken
to all the places I want to go
And Maya Angelou GOOD. She knows
Why the Caged Bird Sings and shares the
secret with us.
Still I Rise.
SMOOTH like Sonia Sanchez, who is so
deep that I fall into her poetry and
meet myself coming out the other end and
LIVING like Langston, holding fast to
Dreams so that they will not die.
He, too, Sings America.
*******
When I can’t catch the lyric to that song
That’s when I want to get my Gwen Ifill on and have
REAL and serious debates around
real and serious topics that
really matter.
With
real outcomes and
real changes.
I want to be Audre Lorde RELEVANT,
like the book of her poetry that is third from the right
on the second shelf
of the 3rd bookcase
that I have in my room.
I want to be as UNCOMPROMISING as Alice,
not the one running after a rabbit,
no
not Alice Wonder but Alice Walker
crafting words that tell it exactly as it is
while still possessing the Secret of Joy within the Temple of My Familiar.
*******
I want to be James
Earl Jones,
Baldwin,
Weldon Johnson
FIERCE,
intoning change-making theater with a
magnificent voice to
Go Tell It on the Mountain,
about the need to
Lift every Voice and Sing.
And sing and sing
Inspired by them all
We too can raise our own voices
So bad we are good
So smooth we are living dreams
So real we are relevant
So uncompromising We. Are. Fierce.
Weaving words that make a DIFFERENCE
And making a difference with our words
As I raise my voice and take a stand,
feet wide-spread, hands on hips,
like someone who deserves to take up space on this planet,
I realize that I want to be
I want to be
I want to be … Me