I am interested in writing more, and so I completed an exercise this morning with a prompt, "Describe the best piece of writing that you've ever constructed." Below is the work that was created from that prompt. Please enjoy both this work as well as the work it mentions.
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On February 24, 2005, I was at my in-laws in Mt. Vernon, NY
and everyone was out shopping for dinner and ingredients for making gooey and decadent
chocolate truffles. It almost felt like
they were the hunters and gatherers while I was holding down the proverbial
fort with my pencil, notebook and schoolbag. I was sitting on the corner of the long dining
room table feasting on my Gender, Race and Class textbook.
I loved the book, but loathed the class. The textbook was
filled with personal stories from people of various oppressions including
people of color, different sexual orientations, and gender expressions and identities. It helped deepen my understanding of
oppression and woke my somewhat still dormant inner activist. However, my frustration with the class was
that my professor would assign these readings from the textbook for homework
and then in class, she would read the assigned passages aloud to us. Sometimes I felt like it was story time at
Pace University’s Pre-K and I would long for my juice and blanky!
And the discussions were dismal. One time, after a reading about sexism, I was
working out a theory in my head about how Catholic females had Mary as a role
model, which seemed unfair. I wanted to
see how the thoughts in my head would match with my professor’s expertise, back
when I thought professors were the experts.
So I asked, “If Mary is the ultimate woman, doesn’t that set all girls
and women up for failure? I mean, to be
as awesome as Mary was a person who identifies as a female Catholic would have
to be able to give birth without having sex. Doesn’t that create a no win
situation for females?” “Also,” I added, “doesn’t that fuel more myths about
rape, sex, and issues around abortion?”
I was on fire with my desire to gain clarity on some of these issues,
for as a young Catholic boy, I was not allowed to ask questions, but had only
to listen and observe. I was eager in my
inquiry to see whether or not my observation held any weight.
My professor smiled and said, “No. That has nothing to do with
sexism.”
In later years, I learned that sexism is all about that and
more. And that was the reason I loved
the book, but loathed the class.
In the book, I read this week’s assignment, which waswritten by Langston Hughes. In this
essay, he explored ways in which a person can internalize oppression. He talked about how he knew of an artist that
didn’t want to be known as a black artist, but simply as an artist alone. He challenged this man’s wish by stating that
he wanted to be known as a white artist because that would be the automatic
assumption of the common person. This
reading had my head reeling. When I
finished reading his essay, I closed the book, and sat and stared at the pink
walls in the dining room. I found it
hard to breathe and I cried for a little while.
Suddenly, I felt a burst of energy and reached past my
notebook for my journal. In it, I
started writing. The words flowed
through my right arm into the pencil and onto the page seamlessly. The words seemed to have a life of its own. It was as if I was a vehicle or instrument
that something bigger than me was using to create the work forming on the
page. When it was done with me, I felt
exhausted and excited. I wondered for a
moment if I had been used to carry a message, like Mary was used to bring God’s
message.
This was one of the few times I had experienced writing
where I didn’t have to think; I was an instrument of something much bigger than
me. It is rare that I feel a connection
with writing, and so I treasure and savor them, much like the way I savored the
chocolate truffles my in-laws made when they returned from shopping later that
night. And the soft and decadent chocolate
truffles were scrumptious, though they melt away so quickly. Lucky for us, writing creates a more
permanent piece of work that can be consumed over and over again.
The work created that night on paper, now digitized is as
follows:
The
Washing Machine - JY
The
melting pot
blending of coloring's not.
What's the true plot?
Like a washing machine bleaching us all clean.
Colorless we seem.
We need to see what's between the sheets, the lines.
It's more than what meets the eyes.
Can you read their minds?
Not while we ride this spin cycle, turning, learning to be burning our own
earning and buy their sense.
Smelling their scent, so pungent and unclean.
Using bleach to hid the mean.
We ain't dirty as they seem.
We are just like them, human beings.
So why do we purchase their dreams, and ideals, learn how to feel how they
feel, wash away and drown out what's real? Is that the new deal?
I think not.
Clean out your closets, shoes and socks.
Hang out your laundry.
Clean and beautiful are we not?
Color so vibrant. Feel the rush of the tide pulling us under, begging us to
hide what's inside.
But we can't be denied our right to fight, to stay true blue, not just red and
white.
This battle's for all.
Hear the cattle call herding us, hurting us and paining themselves.
We ain't in the history you put on your shelves.
Painted by numbers with only one color, raping our sisters and killing our
brothers, is there any way for you to justify or rectify or do I need to build
my own hope and erect it by spreading out the truth?
Let the water subdue.
Realize we're all in this together.
None of our hands are clean in this washing machine.
