Author Contact; cooleyhighinreverse@gmail.com
An Inner City Tale
(ODE TO CABRINI GREEN)
(FIRSTPUBLISHED IN THE ALESTE IN SOUTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY @ EDWARDSVILLE)
FEBRUARY 1999)
Born into a tenement in the heart of the windy city in the summer of sixty-nine,
Fourth small mouth to be fed and second girl in line.
A time just after the assassinations of Malcolm, Medgar, JFK, and Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King
A time when proclamations like "Say It Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud," were the in thing.
When Bell-bottomed jeans and afros swayed effortlessly against the wind,
An era when Motown was king and Stax was In!
Our guardians were diligent and always instilled in us the need to get ahead,
Stressing that there is strength in numbers and to stick together no matter what was said.
70's, school bells, limited teaching apparatuses and burned out teachers and no recess,
Escaping boredom, through reading autobiographies always held my interest.
Benefiting from RIF (Reading is Fundamental) reading Angelou, Hansberry, Morrison, Moody, X and Cruz.
Discovering and rediscovering, Richard Wright, Countee Cullen and Langston Hughes. Brown scarred knees
from repeatedly falling upon thick blacktop. Corner stores, liquors stores, ice cream, pickles, Now-n-laters, barber and beauty shops.
Loud sounds blaring to break through red glistening project walls, Aretha, Chaka, Diana, O'Jays, Jacksons, Curtis Mayfield and Lou Rawls.
Broken elevators, and broken dreams, straightening combs and fade creams. Mayoral candidates making mockeries out of project residents
by handing out V-necks, turkeys, and miniature Christmas trees in exchange for votes. Some project residents coming undone and always
at each others throats. Skateboards, hopscotch, jump rope, Red Light Green Light and Mother May I?
Young men masquerading as gangsters on street corners, over already-conquered city turf, why? Soon childhood laughter is silenced
by gunshots and young bodies dropping. Caskets, tears, sensing my own mortality at 13, anticipating my own heart stopping.
Guardians' tenacity paid off in the spring of '83 they rescued me, Before our transition out of the ghetto, I noticed young women making
spaces in their bellies for little ones, completely throwing caution to the wind, Yeah, babies having babies starting the cycle all over again...
Chicago Defender November 13, 1993.
: I was born in Chicago on August 3, 1969, in the heat of the summer, on a smoldering hot yet peaceful day. After the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the subsequent riots, and the same year as the murder of Black Panther Leader Chairman Fred Hampton Sr. and Mark Clark at the hands of the police.
I was born when Bulls were just charging rodeo animals! My initial breath into this world came at a time in our history when Afraid and bell bottomed jeans were the fashion and black afro picks with a red and green casing on either side could be seen protruding out of the back pockets of many a brother or sister. These were days when Motown was king and Stacy was in! Days when "Say it loud I'm Black and I'm proud were a prominent saying in the black community and Black fists stood tall in the air at the '68 Olympics.
It was also a period when Edwin G. Cooley High loomed larger than life and seem to stretch for six city blocks , directly in front of the Oscar Mayer plant on Sedgwick Avenue. Yes, I came into existence at a time when the foundation was being laid for politicians in the Windy City to fall into a succession of broken promises in the area of creating job opportunities. Nevertheless, I arrived in this world as a bundle of joy and another mouth to feed for Rosetta a teachers assistant and Maurice Ambrose a factory worker.
I was the fourth child brought home to live in the Cabrini Green housing project at in a 3 bedroom apt at 365 W. Oak St. I joined my siblings Karen, Thelonius and Marsay in a life of hope and helplessness. Let me explain. Hope is the dreams you have of someday making the transition out of the projects. And hope was always the stern voice of my mother saying, 'br the best at whatever you do.'
Helplessness is the feelings that comes over you when your more affluent relatives make excuses for why they can't come over to visit you and it is also the feelings you derive from the eyes and the body language of passengers on CTA buses when you reach your destination at Sedgwick and Orleans or Division and Halsted. Welcome to my world...