Poetry
Two generations ago
they packed Saris, Dhoti and spices,
gur, nimbu and rai,
bottles of the Ganges in pockets
with Jack fruit and Durian,
mantras and black hair,
language made for ears,
all these things only to remember.
They crossed the sea,
left Mumbai and the packed streets.
They unpacked the family,
raised children in the memory
of the subcontinent.
They raised American children
with a taste for saffron and McDonald’s.
My parents raised me
with the Power Rangers,
Mickey Mouse,
Costco, VH1 and hip hop.
My ears dead to sitar,
illiterate to Hindi.
I found impracticality in the folds
of my grandparents’ dress.
It wasn’t how he looked at me.
I was how he tried not to.
The way he reacted to my name:
an English name, not foreign enough for my skin.
It was just the way no one sat next to or spoke to me.
The way I felt unwanted.
I never felt it before.
My grandmother always told me
I’m not like them,
I would always be foreign to them,
how they don’t feel I belong.
It hurt.
“Go back to your country,â€Â
Article# 844, Created Jun. 6, 2006 :: Last Update: Jun. 5, 2009
On my way back home the sidewalk hisses
every step becomes a risk
the clouds form worried faces and the sky is green
the sun abandoned me
along with other stars scared of the dark
no one to witness me breathing completely
I exhale loneliness and misdirection
I no longer walk without my orbit
a free drawn path that denies an almighty Lord
the wind keeps trying to find a hole
in my walk to make me trip
and I notice that the houses are locking their doors
street lights bend themselves correct
to keep me trapped
weeds in cracks grow in front of me until
I’m forced to stop moving, thinking, and evolving
but I still breath
that vital air that betrayed me is removed from my diet
I now only inhale ideas relevant to self
Joshua Tuck
Cass Technical High School
Winner 2006 Lotus Press Prize Article# 621, Created Nov. 21, 2005 :: Last Update: Jun. 5, 2009
I want the colors of the rainbow
to crawl into my body,
to dance in my soul.
I want the butterflies
to kiss my eyelids
when I am angry.
I want my niece and me
to sit on the moon
fishing for stars.
I want to chill and drink
Kool-Aid till our bellies burst.
I want us to dance
in the intersection of
Dequindre and 7 mile
to silent music.
I want to waltz
through a persimmon field
with bare feet.
I want to hurl silent poetry
against the walls of my bedroom.
I want to sit in silence
so we can hear
the raindrop get acquainted
with the concrete.
I want to command the locusts
to devour my enemies.
I want to set fire
to the feet
of those who are
afraid to dance.
Marie Wilson
Southwestern High School
Winner 2005 Lotus Press Prize Article# 620, Created Nov. 21, 2005 :: Last Update: Jun. 5, 2009
If you ask me where I have been
I’ll give you the phonebook
I’ll have to start with a whisper about whispers
In a cream church with a white wall and a brown topâ€â€
Article# 619, Created Nov. 21, 2005 :: Last Update: Jun. 5, 2009
Nicholas Cage is Detroit in leather pants
in the driver’s seat of a ’95 Ford
Windstar toting around performance poet people
whining over spilled metaphors on soft Cottonelle
toilet paper.
Nicholas Cage is Detroit on 3rd Ave. dancing to music
of the homeless man with gray eyes & sings
in the choir at New Baptist. His hands shake when he
claps. Nicholas Cage is Detroit singing spirituals on the People
Mover, at COBO Hall, he’s volunteering at the soup kitchen,
paving broken roads, stabbing fools
with their own knives while stitching bullet wounds
in their heads.
Nicholas Cage is Detroit hopped up on frooties and asthma
medicine. He burns the pictures of the prophet in all black that
keeps turning up plastered on lamp posts. Can you see his eyes?
Dark brown , almost black, full of emptiness.
Nicholas Cage is Detroit. In blue
spandex & an “ I Love New Yorkâ€Â
Article# 618, Created Nov. 18, 2005 :: Last Update: Jun. 5, 2009
I watch how the moon sits in the sky
and stares down at me
like I owe it something.
It tells me of the ancient people.
The children of the earth play around their father
as we sit in peace,
as the pendulum swings
from the wood in which we live
to the cities we die.
In every blinding vision
a blast of snow
turns the earth to crystal.
Now I think I know
what Shiva’s thinking
as the moon watches me in the night.
Talmadge Canty
Southwestern High School
Winner 2002 Lotus Press Prize Article# 617, Created Nov. 18, 2005 :: Last Update: Jun. 5, 2009
-after Tyree Guyton’s “Caged Brains†Article# 616, Created Nov. 18, 2005 :: Last Update: Jun. 5, 2009
