Stranger Fruit: The Legacy*
April 16, 2021.
“Hands. Show me your hands. Drop it. Drop it.”
Hands up!
Hands are up!
The boy’s hands are up!
I am screaming now. Take us back in time. Move us back in time. Stop.
The boy’s hands are up. Don’t shoot him!
Time stands still.
But it doesn’t
It is over.
Adam’s life is over.
And the still image of baby face, boy, child, with hands up makes imprints.
I will not watch the video.
But the grainy still image is enough.
Adam Toledo: 13. Stop. Brown face
Anthony Thompson, 17. Stop. Brown face
Tamir Rice, 12. Stop. Brown face
Travyon Martin, 17. Stop. Brown face
Aiyana Jones, 7. Stop. Brown face
Emmett Till, 14. Stop. Brown face
Hannah Ocuish, 12. Stop. Brown face
And there are more and there are more and there are more…
I can’t find all the names!
INTERUPTION: April 20, 2021.
STOP KILLING OUR BLACK AND BROWN CHILDREN!!!!
I add the name:
Ma’Khia Bryant. 16. Stop. Brown face.
And the old school movie reel plays, click, click.
Click.
Jagged images move us back through time.
White Crowd. White Spectators. White Murderers. White White Whitewash. Stop the clicking. Stop the Film. Stop watching.
Consuming Black death Is death to All. Our collective soul is burning.
We die with each image. We cease breath. We ALL cease breath each time, “I can’t breathe” plays. Click, click. Rewind. Click, click again.
Giggles heard across shadows of time
Skittle bag on ground, weighed down by half-full, pieces, rainbow pieces, sweet. Left.
“Adam played with Legos and rode bikes with his siblings”
Half-finished Lego structure, relegated to basement or
Stop.
And the pain as toe steps on lingering Lego on Carpet. The pain.
A Lego.
Like dust that blows across history swirling and swirling around us
They are disappeared
White gaze and then gone
Gone to record
Gone to community
Gone to family
Gone.
“And Black Children Are Six Times More Likely to Be Shot to Death by Police.”
“The lawyer said that the shooting, while tragic, was justified given the nature of the threat.”
Like a manic murder that most of us white folks say, “this can’t be happening” even as we consume and consume and consume Black life. IT IS HAPPENING!!!!!! I am screaming. Black and brown children are consumed by us. STOP.
White folks, TAKE RESPONSIBILITY. One white man’s action is SHAME on all of us. We all pulled that trigger. Don’t cover your ears, close your eyes, or escape to fantasy. I speak to myself here as I speak to all of us. I am speaking to White folks, to those us of who study and teach race and childhood. It is time to do more, to yell louder and to use the power we have unjustly been granted in our institutions. We sit at the tables. We hold the reins and the whip. Listen. We hold the lash. It is time that we recognize the power we have unjustly benefited from and speak and act. We must speak, act, and ABOLISH THE POLICE. The institution must be torn out from its roots. The root system lingers and we must dig and dig and dig with all of our might. It is time to build community safety through ways that respect ALL life. BLACK LIVES MATTER.
*Thank you to Gaylene Gordon for the title of this piece, in reference to Billie Holiday’s 1954, “Strange Fruit”.