There have been some interesting posts on women and justice recently – and I was inspired to post this poem. I wrote this during the summer after hearing radio segments about the London subway bombing.
There was a particularly haunting broadcast of a Nigerian immigrant mother at first searching for her son, and then, after hearing of his death, appealing to others not to follow the path of violence. Of course, we all react to these events from our own particular identities and life situations — but there is something universal about mothers reacting to violence — on either side of any conflict.
Brown Boy
(Radio News – July 22, 2005)
Where is he my Anthony?
I am looking looking for my son
My son my firstborn
Only twenty-six years old
Can someone tell me
Tell me
Where is he?
Londoners
Grim faced and dusty
Are making their way
Out of their bombed tube stations
When the lamentations
Of Anthonys mother
Awaken them to their new city
Nigerian immigrant mother
She has forgotten
The rules of British propriety
Her Anthony and his siblings used to
Hammer home
Dont shout, Mama
Softer, Shhh
Dont cry in public
Mama
Dont
Anthonys mother
Does not hear their admonishment but
Wails
For the supple ebony limbs
Of her boy
Her grief
Shoots over radio waves
Shattering my windshield
Cutting me open
A thousand miles away
A scalpel
Re-opening my belly where
Three years ago
They pulled out
My own stubborn son
When the buildings fell
In my city
I was not yet a mother
And my fear
Only selfish
*****
Two weeks later now
Today
In the car in the sun
On the crowded Tappan Zee Bridge
The radio tells me
They shot and killed
An brown boy in the London tube
The police had heard
Terrorists come in that shade
He was a young bloke
Says the Cockney accented eye witness
The only funny thing his blue baseball cap
And heavy quilted jacket
Given the humid spell weve been having
The three men running after him
I didnt know no one could
That they were coppers
Plainclothes except for the big black
Handgun
I was helping a woman, large-built
From the compartment and I saw his face
Just a second before he tripped
And fell they pushed him then to
The ground the three men and fired
Five bullets into him
There on the ground and his life
Was over
He had looked like a scared rabbit and
Then he was dead
The large-built woman went off
With the London police
She was
Very
Shaken
I grip my steering wheel
Trapped
In traffic
Behind a giant Budweiser truck
Decorated with an enormous American
Flag
****
Oh Anthonys mother
I want to get home
Home to my first born
My son
His limbs are almond colored
And soft
I want to shake him and
Make sure no one
Has given him
A toy gun
While I was not looking
I will call his uncle
And tell him
No more hiding in dark corners
And leaping out
At my son saying
The monsters coming to get you
For weeks after
My boy
Half-nervous, half-smiling
Will ask me if
He has seen a monster
Furrowing his brows in postured bravery
Closing his tiny fists hard
No, no
There are no monsters
I begin quickly, opening
His hands again
Then,
And monsters are sometimes kind
Im not sure what Im saying
But Im afraid
Anthonys mother
Spoke again, today
On the radio
A different woman it seemed
If the sound of my voice
Convinces anyone
Not to take this path
Not to choose violence for
The glory of God or Allah
If I can reach
One young man
Then my Anthonys death
Is not in vain
Oh do not wear
Quilted jackets
During a hot London
Summer
I will tell my boy
I will wake him
From his peaceful nap
And make him promise
Not to wear plainclothes
Or chase suspects
Pumping five bullets
Into their flesh
But I am trapped
Behind the truck
The flag
The steering wheel
Oh mother
Where is he
Your Anthony
That brown boy
My son
My firstborn
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