To The Boys Who May One Day Date My Daughter

2014 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational
Jesse Parent
To The Boys Who May One Day Date My Daughter

My Name

2016 Brave New Voices
#iTooAmAmerica Contest
Shineque, Trinidad and Tobago
My Name




It is 8:45 am.
The roll is being called.
I watch as the teacher struggles to pronounce my name, attempting once, twice, three times
failing each time
eyebrows knitted
close together
eyes squinting
as if this would squeeze the pronunciation from the page before her
I sit waiting.
Waiting for her to ask me for the proper pronunciation.
I wait until I can feel the weight of each eye in the room rest on me
she is looking me directly in my eyes
then altogether forgets about pronouncing my first name
and says my middle name.
"Emily?"

See that was the first real thing I was taught in high school.
That African names that don't follow the slave master's rules are still hard for some white folk swallow.
So, I am unable to rest easy in my chair,
my chair urged me to get up,
to say something,
but Emily can't, see
I went through most of my life without a name,
not having anything to identify with.
This land is not my home
I had to learn how to speak all over again
because they said that my original accent only accentuates my skin that stands out like an accent in a Spanish word in an English sentence

I needed to pick my struggle.
So I struggled to silence the beat of African drums in my tongue,
I tried to steady the rhythm that was up in my words every time I speak.
I chose the struggle I could control.
Because I could not control the fornication of my ancestors
as they allowed the sun to make love to their skin out of wedlock,
I chose the struggle I could control.

So now, this seven-letter, three-syllable brand given to me by my parents
became a brand esteemed  higher than any designer name,
it became alive and danced the beat of African drums in my tongue
and moved to the rhythm that was up in my words every time I speak
through sweat and heat came a child of 'I belong'
a child of sun-kissed skin and rumpy hair
a child of my name
is Shamiso
And it is of Shona origin
it means astonishing event, marvel

and I sometimes sit and marvel at the fact that it took me 8 years to learn how to say my name
See in school they taught me names that brought back too many painful memories,
names that my ancestors were forced to wrap their tongues around,
their tongues forced to love a strange language.
See, I'm sorry Mr. Wordsworth,
I can not relate to sonnet "Composed Upon Westminister Bridge",
since slaves did not have the luxury of taking long leisurely walks on Westminister Bridge,
they were too busy working.

See that is why I was given my name
my name is my shield, my voice, a two-edged sword,
we need to learn our names that are written in blood on the hands of many white men.
How does it feel to wrap your tongue around a strange language,
to force your American tongue to love every syllable of my African name,

It is 8:45 am.
The roll is being called.
The teacher looks at me,
"Shamiso?"

See I told my teacher something she never learned in school,
you either learn my name or choke on my roots --
my name is Shamiso.
My name is Shamiso.
Put some respect on that.

The Way to a Woman's Heart

Poet: Jenesis Fonseca

In my family, there is always a kitchen.

In the kitchen, there are always women.

And in the women, there is always fear.

Fear that this time, the recipe won’t work. 

That the man will leave his meal unfinished.

Thats the man’s stomach will find pleasure in someone else’s home.

That she has served him too much or not enough.

That he is already too full or hungry for something else.

And that it will be the woman’s fault.

Too much sugar, or not enough, I guess.

In my family, good cooking is a valued centerpiece.

Keeps the men close, brings them home every night.

Grandmother believed a good meal says “I love you,” better than a kiss.

Grandmother believed a good meal says “I’m sorry” better than an apology.

Like my grandmother, my mother serves an excess, says “you can never, never love too much.”

One night, Daddy didn’t come home for dinner.

His plate left cold on the table.

He woke Mommy up at four in the morning after his night out drinking,

dragged her by the hair into the kitchen demanding she cook him his favorite meal.

She said, “chiles rellenos”

“I’m sorry.”

A side of rice.

“I love you.”

Another beer from the fridge.

“I’m sorry I love you.”

Breakfast next morning was the last time she apologized for him.

Her cooking is best, but the men in my mother’s life have never stayed for seconds.

They say, “the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach."

There is no proverb about the way to a woman’s heart.

The way into her is more important.

Two daughters later, and years after the divorce, my mother still cooks like there’s a man in the house.

She glances at the empty chair on our table and asks me more than once, if i’m sure dinner tastes good tonight.

I guess apologies can taste a lot like love sometimes.

I don’t know how to cook.

The man I love cooks for me.

Knows the way to my heart isn’t food or roses, but the kind of honest love that fills.

And I may not know how to cook yet.

But Mommy still showed me how to love - myself, too much, always.

Even if he doesn’t stay.

The Period Poem

poet: Dominique Christina

[foreword]

So, let me be very clear. I wrote this poem with a very specific intent.

I have a 13-year-old daughter. It is important to me that I throw every part of my experience and whatever wisdom I’ve gleaned from that - every part of my backbone toward her, to sustain her, to offer her language that lifts her up and keeps her up. That said, there is, for me, a necessary conversation. That seeks to undermine the shaming that happens to some girls around menstruation.

I had that experience of starting my period in 7th grade. Boys, you know, finding out that I had started my period and then you know - it was some shit. Like you know, I would be in the class with that frantic like ‘gotta go to the bathroom now!’ wave.

And they would be like “ugh, you’re on your period aren’t you, ugh” - you know, that dumb shit. 

And so, my daughter, like she starts her period and she’s stricken and walks out the bathroom looking like she’s died or something. 

And I wanted to undermine that. So I threw her a period party, my homies rolled up, dressed in red, and there was red food, and red drinks. It was great. And it was great, it was great!

You know, all red everything - fuck it.

So that’s what it was and it was wonderful.

And then when I was Austin, Texas for Women of the World this year, she sent me a screenshot of a tweet. And in a hundred and forty characters this dummy, you know, damn near undermined my legacy!

This is my response to aforementioned dummy.

[audience voice: thank you!]

You’re welcome.

[poem begins]

Dude on Twitter says, quote: “I was having sex with my girlfriend when she started her period. I dumped that bitch immediately.”

Dear nameless dummy on Twitter: you’re the reason my daughter cried funeral tears when she started her period. The sudden grief all young girls feel after the matriculation from childhood and the induction into reality that they gon’ have to negotiate you and your disdain for what a woman’s body can do - herein begins an anatomy lesson infused with feminist politics because I hate you.

There is a thing called a uterus. 

It sheds itself every 28 days or so, or in my case every 23 days - I’ve always been a rule breaker that’s the anatomy part - I digress.

The feminist politic part is that women know how to let things go. 

How to let a dying thing leave the body. 

How to become new, how to regenerate, how to wax and wane, not unlike the moon and tides, both of which influence how you behave - I digress.

Women have vaginas that can speak to each other. 

By this I mean, when we’re with our friends, our sisters, our mothers, our menstrual cycles will actually sync the fuck up. 

My own cervix is mad influential - everyone I love knows how to bleed with me. 

Hold on to that- there’s a metaphor in it. Hold on to that.

But when your mother carried you, 

the ocean in her belly is what made you born, 

made you possible, 

you had it under your tongue when you burst through her skin - 

wet and panting from the heat of her body, 

the body whose machinery you now mock on social media,

 that body wrapped you in everything that was miraculous about it and sung you lullabies laced in platelets, 

without which you wouldn’t have any Twitter account at all motherfucker — I digress!

See, it’s possible that we know the world better because of the blood that visits some of us. 

It interrupts our favorite white skirts and shows up at dinner parties unannounced - blood will do that, period. 

It will come when you are not prepared for it, blood does that, period. 

Blood is the biggest siren, and we understand that blood misbehaves, it does not wait for a hand signal, or a welcome sign above the door. 

And when you deal in blood, over and over again like we do, when it keeps returning to you, well - that makes you a warrior. 

And while all good generals know not to discuss battle plans with the enemy - let me say this to you dummy on Twitter.

If there’s any balance in the universe at all - you gon’ be blessed with daughters. 

Blessed - etymylogically blessed means to “make bleed” see now it’s a lesson in linguistics, in other words blood speaks - that’s the message, stay with me.

See your daughters gon’ teach you what all men must come to know,

 that women made of moonlight magic and macabre will make you know the blood. 

We gon’ get it all over the sheets and car seats. 

We gon’ do that. 

We gon’ introduce you to our insides, period. 

And if you are as unprepared as we sometimes are, we’ll get it all over you and leave a forever stain.

So to my daughter. 

Should any fool mishandle the wild geography of your body. 

How it rides a red running current, like any good wolf or witch, 

well then just bleed, bull. 

Give that blood a biblical name. Something of stone and mortar. 

Name it after Eve’s first rebellion in that garden. 

Name it after the last little girl to have her genitals mutilated in Kinshasa - that was this morning.

Give it as many syllables as there are unreported rape cases. 

Name the blood something holy, something mighty, something unlanguagable, something in hieroglyphs. something that sounds like the end of the world. 

Name it for the roar between your legs, and for the women who will not be nameless. 

Here, just bleed anyhow, spill your impossible scripture, all over the good furniture. 

Bleed, and bleed, and bleed 

on everything he loves. 

Period.