Tina Boyer Brown is the managing director of the arts conservatories and creative writing department head at the Chicago High School for the Arts.
More By This Poet
School—12:15
Imagine the lunchroom,
crowded and wary—
seating charts a welcome apprehension.
Loose-leaf
papers spiraled from
ballpoint-scratched notebook covers
until the last hour,
when a teacher
sighed and sighed.
Today, we close our backpacks,
but minutes
come quick and quit
the ease of dawn.
Respectability
We ask our children
to act calm/nervous/whatever
innocent looks like when
some cop shows his badge/pulls his gun/slows his car.
We beg kids
to say soft yes sirs.
We beg kids
to get on the hood of that car/empty their pockets/shut up/put your hands behind your head.
No is...