Toomer

(Jean Toomer)

I did not wish to “rise above”

or “move beyond” my race. I wished

to contemplate who I was beyond

my body, this container of flesh.

I made up a language in which to exist.

I wondered what God breathed into me.

I wondered who I was beyond

this complicated, milk-skinned, genital-ed body.

I exercised it, watched it change and grow.

I spun like a dervish to see what would happen. Oh,

to be a Negro is—is?—

to be a Negro, is. To be.

Credit

Author

Elizabeth Alexander

Elizabeth Alexander was born in 1962 in Harlem, New York, and grew up in Washington, D.C. She currently serves as a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets.

Date Published

01/01/2010