Tina Boyer Brown is the managing director of the arts conservatories and creative writing department head at the Chicago High School for the Arts.
More By This Poet
Respectability
We ask our children
to act calm/nervous/whatever
innocent looks like when
some cop shows his badge/pulls his gun/slows his car.
We beg kids
to say soft yes sirs.
We beg kids
to get on the hood of that car/empty their pockets/shut up/put your hands behind your head.
No is...