Safety Pen: A Poem
Albuquerque poet and community organizer Ebony Isis Booth shares her poem in response to #SafetyPinSupport in the days following the US Presidential Election. #BlackPoetsSpeak
Safety Pen: A Poem
safety pen
by Ebony Isis Booth
how different we are today
now that safety pins
secure personhood and humanity
affixed to lapels in earnest
like nervous prom dates
wielding straight pins like
bayonets near boutonnieres
on the left side
right
a little medal over your heart
purple and swollen
battered by tears and histamines
accelerated by estate wines and
streaming statistics
run down cheeks
run from exit polls
run up flag poles
to bring down bigotry
like Bree Newsome in Charleston
ten days after hate made
parishioners prey while they prayed
that cat caught nine lives and a trip
to Burger King drive thru
safety pin the America that raised
Dylan Roof
and lowered expectations
of disenfranchised youth
safety pin the America who has grown
bored with its own face
elitist mockery of such
stone chiseled European noses carved
into stolen mountains
if a Kardashian can
let us too cut out the ugly
surgically resurface the office of President
derma-plastics black doesn’t crack
but neither does granite
belay down your forefathers’
newly gentrified countenance
out of spite
a nation about face
who needs noses anyway
safety pin an America
with a plan for my safety
that does not end with awkward
allies calling the police in an
effort to save me
or excuse themselves from the
frayed seams of my black life
and a blue uniform
because in America it still seems as though
we cannot believe
what we refuse to see
show me your safety pin
a subtle gesture with the responsibility
of lighthouses in hurricanes
convince me that your pin will be visible
through the shit storm
we have been here before
survivors of the middle passage
ten thousand leagues under the Atlantic
there are legions of ancestors at my back
and armies of allies with all their tactics
consider the confidence of unified savages
tell me to focus my attention on this tiny beacon
guiding your confusion
the next time
you want me to explain why eye contact
is more effective than an accessory
when it comes to safety
conciliatory gestures are menacing
refuge in the open arms of a well-meaning stranger
with the capacity for only one marooned body at a time
presents a series of new threats unless
your coat can warm me and mine
conversations around the water cooler have
never been safer
I have never been interested
I have always been obligated by my skin
to listen as white Americans struggle to
find comfort in colorful conversation
but now
the safety pin is the solution
while I appreciate the sentiment
narcissism wins again and
spins a narrative about how
my struggle ain’t real
until you see it
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