*Gregory Djanikian was born of Armenian heritage in Alexandria, Egypt, in 1949, and
emigrated to the United States with his family in 1957. The themes present in
Djanikian’s poems range from his boyhood growing up in Alexandria, Egypt, to romantic
love, as well as the Armenian genocide of 1915.
When I First Saw Snow
Tarrytown, N.Y.
Bing Crosby was singing "White Christmas"
on the radio, we were staying at my aunt's house
waiting for papers, my father was looking for a job.
We had trimmed the tree the night before,
sap had run on my fingers and for the first time
I was smelling pine wherever I went.
Anais, my cousin, was upstairs in her room
listening to Danny and the Juniors.
Haigo was playing Monopoly with Lucy, his sister,
Buzzy, the boy next door, had eyes for her
and there was a rattle of dice, a shuffling
of Boardwalk, Park Place, Marvin Gardens.
There were red bows on the Christmas tree.
It had snowed all night.
My boot buckles were clinking like small bells
as I thumped to the door and out
onto the grey planks of the porch dusted with snow.
The world was immaculate, new,
even the trees had changed color,
and when I touched the snow on the railing
I didn't know what I had touched, ice or fire.
I heard, ''I'm dreaming ..."
I heard, "At the hop, hop, hop ... oh, baby."
I heard "B & 0" and the train in my imagination
was whistling through the great plains.
And I was stepping off,
I was falling deeply into America.
*Born in 1947, Pedro Pietri is a poet and playwright of Puerto Rican heritage. He
helped found the Nuyorican Poets Café in New York City. The Cafe is an institution
where many Puerto Rican intellectuals perform.
The Old Buildings
(1422 amsterdam avenue)
everybody knew
everybody else
everybody respected
& loved everybody else
unity was happening
whenever somebody
cooked pastels
everybody in the building
was invited to eat
this is how together
everybody was in
those days (city hall
saw this harmony happening
and got intimidated
because there is nothing
that frightens
this government more
than seeing people
living and loving
and breathing together
so they decided to
demolish the buildings
that could have been
saved by renovation
& eliminate the unity)
everybody was moved
away from each other
to so-called better places
where you do not know
anybody when you move in
& you do not know anybody
when you move out
dead or alive or in
a straitjacket
the system tailored especially for you
and all your close relatives
who came here looking
for better days and
finding the worst nights
of their existence as
they went from funeral
parlor to funeral parlor
looking for coffins
that were not too expensive
*Michael S. Weaver is an African American poet and playwright. He was born in
Baltimore, Maryland in 1951.
A Black Man’s Sonata
FOR JOHN DOWELL
Here in West Philadelphia,
one of my neighbors was
a black man just released from jail.
Home again, he imposed
a frigid order on his family.
He staked his territory,
crossing the street to threaten
a woman with his gun.
He tried his bravado in a bar,
and a man angrier than him
put a bullet in my neighbor’s brain.
His house was hushed and solemn
as relatives came and went.
I think he wanted to die.
He threatened people and strutted
like a tiger because a bundle of hurt,
a mess of dangling threads, rags,
and curses had replaced his heart.
If I ever wonder where
America’s heart is, I have only
to come to my neighborhood,
black homes of the poor and working poor.
The country radiates out from them
in history’s circle where wealth
is built on poverty. If I ever
wonder whether to be poor
and black is to be exempt from evil,
I have only to watch the eyes
that watch me as I walk home.
They look for a weakness,
like tigers in the grass.
They look to see if I am a tiger, too.
The young boys, the hip hops,
are all about respect.
Respect me, and I’ll respect you.
They were born after Aretha Franklin
sang out respect between man and woman.
The hip hops say, don’t dis me man.
Many of them will not live
to be men, to go creaking along
in the streets with old bones.
Many of them will not know
The fear an old black man fears,
of death, of not seeing grandchildren.
I walk the streets slowly, heavily,
knowing my wife hates the streets,
praying the young will not devour us.
We sleep under the sun’s needles,
our deep black stripes in a fire yellow.
*Joseph Bruchac is a storyteller and writer of Abenaki Indian, English, and Slovak
ancestry. For over thirty years Joseph Bruchac has been creating poetry, short stories,
novels, anthologies and music that reflect his Abenaki Indian heritage and Native
American traditions. (See www.josephbruchac.com)
Birdfoot’s Grampa
The old man
must have stopped our car
two dozen times to climb out
and gather in his hands
the small toads blinded
by our lights and leaping,
live drops of rain.
The rain was falling,
and a mist about his white hair
and I kept saying
you can’t save them all,
accept it, get back in
we’ve got places to go.
But, leathery hands full
of wet brown life,
knee deep in the summer
roadside grass,
he just smiled and said
they have places to go to
too.
*Lucille Clifton, (1936 – 2010) was an American writer and educator from Buffalo, New
York. Common topics in her poetry include the celebration of her African American
heritage, and feminist themes, with particular emphasis on the female body.
In the Inner City
in the inner city
or
like we call it
home
we think a lot about uptown
and the silent nights
and the houses straight as
dead men
and the pastel lights
and we hang on to our no place
happy to be alive
and in the inner city
or
like we call it
home
Night Vision
the girl fits her body in
to the space between the bed
and the wall. she is a stalk,
exhausted. she will do some
thing with this. she will
surround these bones with flesh.
she will cultivate night vision.
she will train her tongue
to lie still in her mouth and listen.
the girl slips into sleep.
her dream is red and raging.
she will remember
to build something human with it.
*Rose Romano was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY and is the granddaughter of
Neapolitan and Sicilian immigrants.
The Bucket
Why is it I can’t sleep tonight?
My teeth are brushed,
my alarm is set, yet
something is rising in me.
I’m thinking of the way
her eyebrows rose,
small, black eyebrows
over wide, brown eyes,
and the way she said—
But how would they know?
So simple, an obvious solution—
no one need ever know
I’m Italian. My grandmother
said so. She told me to shut up, in her
Neapolitan.
Her phrases sing through my life
and no one need ever know. This
is Italian wisdom—shut up.
If no one knows
they won’t be able to
find us; therefore
they won’t rape us anymore
they won’t lynch us anymore
they won’t shoot us anymore
they won’t deny us jobs anymore
they won’t deny us apartments anymore
they won’t deny us education anymore
and it seems to be working very well.
It’s almost my fault
I didn’t get those jobs
or those apartments. I could
have changed my name, kept
my mouth shut. I’m light enough.
My father thinks it’s wise
To laugh at ethnic jokes.
This is the old Italian strategy
of rising above your problems.
We don’t ignore our problems—
we become people for whom these
problems
are not our problems. Americans
don’t understand—they believe
this means we have no problems.
But Americans don’t recognize Italian
wisdom—they wouldn’t find it
if it smelled like provolone.
I know, because
wisdom smells like provolone.
But I heard
a good one the other day—
what’s the difference between an Italian
and a bucket of shit?
It’s almost my fault
I didn’t get those jobs
or those apartments or
those friends. I could
have changed my name, kept
my mouth shut. I’m light enough.
Not all Italians can say that.
With her rising eyebrows,
she tossed aside my heritage
not because
she thinks it’s worthless,
but because
she doesn’t know it’s there.
But how would she know? It seems
to be working very well. Our enemies
cannot find us; therefore
our friends cannot find us.
Why is it I can’t sleep tonight?
Something is rising in me.
*Amina Baraka (formerly known as LeRoi Jones) was born Everett LeRoy Jones in
Newark, New Jersey, 1934. Often a controversial figure, he is an American writer of
poetry, drama, fiction, essays, and music criticism.
The Last Word
i’d rather my fist be made of steel
than my heel made of iron
i’d rather water the earth with my tears
than lose feeling
i’d rather walk
than ride the backs of workers
i’d rather die fighting
than live slaving
i’d rather be criticized for protest poetry
than write lines indifferent to my people’s lives
leave me to my “propaganda”
let my songs call for Freedom
turn down my manuscripts
poem after poem
tell me i’m repetitious
the word oppression is used too much
i’d rather complain
than say nothing at all
i hope my last words
call for revolution
i’d rather my pen
be at least as mighty as the sword
*Lamont B. Steptoe, born 1949 in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, is an African American with
Cherokee blood. He is a poet, photographer and publisher.
Wired In
My entire life
has been spent
in refugee camps
in spite of television
electric lights
running water
cadillac footprints down asphalt roads
all moments lived
have been in the camps
on the outskirts of American cities
So many hours
blinded by juke box lights
of Saturday night mornings
only those of us inside understand
the nature of
captivity
of madness
**Kemal Ozer was born in Turkey in 1935, lives in Istanbul and is one of the most
prolific and active figures of the contemporary Turkish literary scene.
At the Beach
The waves are erasing the footprints
Of those who are walking the beach
The wind is carrying away the words
Two people are saying to each other
But still they are walking
Their feet making new footprints
Still the two are talking together
Finding new words.
*Joy Harjo was born in 1951 in Tulsa, Oklahoma to Native American and Canadian
ancestry. She is strongly influenced by her Muskogee Creek heritage, feminist and social
concerns, and her background in the arts. Harjo frequently incorporates Native American
myths, symbols, and values into her writing.
I Give You Back
I release you, my beautiful and terrible
fear. I release you. You were my
beloved
and hated twin, but now, I don’t know
you
as myself. I release you with all the
pain I would know at the death of
my daughters.
I am not afraid to be angry.
I am not afraid to rejoice.
I am not afraid to be black.
I am not afraid to be white.
I am not afraid to be hungry.
I am not afraid to be full.
I am not afraid to be hated.
I am not afraid to be loved.
You are not my blood anymore.
to be loved, to be loved, fear.
I give you back to the white soldiers
who burned down my home, beheaded
my children,
raped and sodomized my brothers and
sisters.
I give you back to those who stole the
food from our plates when we were
starving.
I release you, fear, because you hold
these scenes in front of me and I was
born
with eyes that can never close.
I release you, fear, so you can no longer
keep me naked and frozen in the winter,
or smothered under blankets in the
summer.
I release you
I release you
I release you
I release you
Oh, you have choked me, but I gave you
the leash.
You have gutted me but I gave you the
knife.
You have devoured me, but I laid myself
across the fire.
You held my mother down and raped
her,
but I gave you the heated
thing.
I take myself back, fear.
You are not my shadow any longer.
I won’t hold you in my hands.
You can’t live in my eyes, my ears, my
voice
my belly, or in my heart my heart
my heart my heart
But come here, fear
I am alive and you are so afraid
of dying.
**Muhammad al-Ghuzzi was born in the ancient city of Qairwan in 1949 and has
worked as a teacher. He has also translated Swedish poetry into Arabic.
The Pen
Take a pen in your uncertain fingers
Trust, and be assured
That the whole world is a sky-blue butterfly
And words are the nets to capture it.
**Guadalupe Morfin, born in Mexico in 1953, has studied law, theology and social
sciences, and works for the publishing department of the University of Guadalajara. In
October 2003 she was appointed Commissioner for the Prevention and Eradication of
Violence against Women in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua.
Paper Doll
Paper doll got tired
but said nothing,
she went on letting herself
be written on,
got flooded with ink
and just in time was saved
from dying of the last period
because she climbed onto
a paper ship
and disembarked on the sea.
There, paper doll
started swimming,
and the ocean all around,
was, for an instant,
a blue soup of tiny letters.
**Octavio Paz was born in Mexico in 1914. He is one of the best-known poets of Latin
America and has also served as a diplomat in Asia and Europe.
A Tree Within
A tree grew inside my head.
A tree grew in.
Its roots are veins,
its branches nerves,
thoughts its tangled foliage.
Your glance sets it on fire,
and its fruits of shade
are blood oranges
and pomegranates of flame.
Day breaks
in the body’s night.
There, within, inside my head,
the tree speaks.
Vijaya Mukhopadhyay, born in India in 1937, had been active in the modern Bengali
poetry movement since 1964, publishing books, editing journals, participating in
international seminars and lectures, and working with translations.
Wanting to Move
Continually, a bell rings in my heart.
I was supposed to go somewhaere, to some other place,
Tense from the long wait—
Where do you go, will you take me
“With you, on your horses, down the river, with the flame
of your torches?”
They burst out laughing.
“A tree wanting to move from place to place!”
Startled, I look at myself—
A tree, wanting to move from place to place, a tree
Wanting to move? Am I then—
Born here, to die here
Even die here?
Who rings the bell, then, inside my heart?
Who tells me to go, inside my heart?
Who agitates me, continually, inside my heart?
**Musō Soseki (Japan) was a thirteenth-century Zen teacher with more than 13,000
students, as well as the father of the Japanese rock garden.
House of Spring
Hundreds of open flowers
all come from
the one branch
Look
all their colors
appear in my garden
I open the clattering gate
and in the wind
I see
the spring sunlight
already it has reached
worlds without number
Works Cited
Gillan, Maria M., and Jennifer Gillan. Unsettling America: an anthology of contemporary
multicultural poetry. New York: Penguin Books, 1994. Print.
Nye, Naomi Shihab. This same sky: a collection of poems from around the world. New
York, NY: Aladdin Paperbacks, 1996. Print.
*Biographical information and poems derived from Unsettling America: an anthology of
contemporary multicultural poetry.
**Biographical information and poems derived from This same sky: a collection of
poems from around the world.