My Friday, July 8, 2016 was filled with an abundance of noise and silence - a day of endless introspection.
Being forced to internalize the current state of our nation, while having to still go to work and attempt to live life normally was by far one of the most unique situations I have ever experienced.
My day was consistently filled with mixed feelings – whether it was in regards to going to a mid-day gathering during which an overwhelming majority crowd of white people created a “remembrance circle” in one of New Orleans’ gentrification meccas and collectively chanted the names of the [at that time] 136 Black people killed by police this year – or whether it was in regards to my numerous relationships with white friends and their varying degrees of acknowledgement and support during this traumatic period.
I chose to leave work early partly due to my mental discombobulation and partly due to the need to bring a receipt for reimbursement to the foundation that supports the team that I currently work for. This foundation’s building happens to be in Lee Circle – the now infamous Lee Circle whose statue removal caused intense division and controversy in my hometown earlier this year.
It was 4:30 p.m. and the office had already put barricades around its steps to prevent forthcoming protesters from overflowing onto the property. As I walked back to my car under the begrudging gaze of General Lee and glancing at “ALTON STERLING” spray-painted in red across the statue’s base, I was unexpectedly greeted with an expression of love from a woman who I’d learn to be known as Ms. Lucy.
“Young man! Has anyone told you that they love you today? I want you to know that I love you,” she exclaimed.
Ms. Lucy appeared quite disheveled and was most likely homeless. And yet with all the presumed turmoil in her life, she found it necessary to acknowledge my plight as a Black man in America by expressing her love.
Ms. Lucy’s expression of love, in addition to other influential experiences throughout my 8 of July, inspired me to express my love in a letter below – particularly speaking to my fellow Black men and boys who need it more than ever during this time.
Dear Magical Brother,
In these times of tragedy and despair, attempt to find solace in the fact that the higher power made you for all of this.
You were made to give sight to the blind and lead them with light out of the darkness.
You were made to be more supernatural to run the fastest and the farthest.
You were made to be incessantly loved and passionately hated.
You were made to express your power and confidence and often be berated.
You were made to humbly question your strength and identity.
You were made to rise from this uncertainty like a phoenix and spread your glory to the world righteously.
You were made to break slavery’s shackles and the ropes they used to hang us from trees.
You were made to more appropriately absorb the light from the sun’s beams.
You were made to be stolen from your land and build countries that were not your own.
You were made to rule as the richest person in the history of the world, but then be taught that you never had a throne.
You were made to philosophize prior to Socrates and Plato.
You were made to discover stars and planets before Galileo.
You were made to vibrate at a higher frequency and possess a rhythm that cannot be explained.
You were made to become stronger from the adversity when others falter from this abundance of pain.
You were made to be excessively stereotyped and expand the minds of the ignorant.
You were made to disquiet their traditional comfort and make them question their historical significance.
You were made to lead revolutions and establish independent communities and nations.
You were made to extraordinarily succeed in an unjust system that undermines your creation.
With light and love,
Ibn Chenier
―
Those words were for Alton Sterling, Philando Castile, and the now 135 other Black people who have been killed by police this year (I was notified of Alva Braziel as I write this).
Those words were for Black people in the United States who are consistently forced to live with confusion, fear and anger.
Those words were for young black boys who may not yet be aware of their magic and prowess.
I encourage every reader to add their own respective lines to the poem above in the comments below.