Category: Student Work

I live on Independence; each block a different terrain of street. Some like slabs of moon with craters that can turn a good car’s transmission belly up and puncture the vulnerable underside, and others smooth and quickly driven. The houses you pass have the history of the city written into their structure, three prominent cultures carved into the ironwork, displayed in shutters, and felt in the layout. My house is at the end of the 1600 block where Independence meets Claiborne. William C.C. Claiborne was the first non-colonial governor of Louisiana and of the English. A mortal man seeking to brand his legacy into the land he governed—essentially a weak play at immortality—his name will be a major intersection at the center of the Crescent City with three remembered father’s.

When people look at me their first impression is that I’m black. Then I speak and not only am I not from the South, I’m definitely not from New Orleans, and I’m not really black. Then they hear my name and wonder if I speak Spanish. They never think to ask if I’m Latina and they never guess I’m from Jamaica—speech lessons bleached out my accent long ago. When a foreign colored person immigrates to America, they take on the title “Black.” There’s no Nigeria or Sierra Leone or any other country in that continent, they’re automatically African. They become ensnared in the history of the survivors of the Atlantic slave trade. It becomes their new identity, regardless of whether they are currently or ancestrally from some place in Africa.

You can see the English bones built in the high houses on Esplanade. The English were the last to settle in the belly of New Orleans, and English was the first to cultivate my tongue. English was my first language and it came in two parts, the birth of a gulf that separated my mother and father for 21 years till they met. Their dialects of English met on my mom’s Jamaica, and he brought us back to America five years after my conception. My vocal chords were like the false bones you have when you’re a baby at that time, the cartilage still malleable. Old and new English are at war in my throat; it’s a cold pressure in my head, and an embarrassing nausea in my chest. Jamaica and most of the Caribbean have the same colonial ethnic history.

In Jamaica we drive on the left side of the road and “color” is written “colour,” and so when I came to America I spoke like its mother and no child speaks like the preceding generation. Jamaica is one of, if not the, only island in the Caribbean that speaks English as its first and only language. The whole country speaks in a broken slang, with throats and tongues dipped in twang. It developed from a past scared to be “smart” to its enslavers, but nevertheless it’s still English. I came to America, the land that outside eyes—people of paradise and people who are paralyzed–visualise as paradise and I  was remade to fit their code. Speech lessons to speak “proper” English stole the Jamaican jewels ingrained in my teeth and locked them away for heated moments.

So many Americans want to experience culture, a deep-rooted connection that’s lost in the business of their streets, but when it meets them face to face they automatically try to break the stallion. Imagine a sheet of printer paper folded into a horse. The horse is history, its events written with black ink. The horse is black. Regardless people try to coerce the ink out of the stallion, to rewrite with what’s relative. In my experience it was Americans who tried to re-break the bones and rename the roads, but me and I are interchangeable in my house. Till m-e turned to m-i and and turned to y.

Claiborne can’t bring you everywhere, so sometimes when I exit the driveway of my house, I turn left. Galvez is the next main street that runs parallel to Claiborne. Bernardo de Galvez was a colonial governor of Louisiana and Cuba. Cuba is north of Jamaica and I think it’s only fitting. If Jamaica is at the center of my life compass and the proper direction to go in go is up, where am I to go? No soy de Cuba pero mi Padrino y su familia son. Todos hablan español y mi Papi también. Mi Padrino no habla mucho inglés y mi mama y mi hermanita no hablan español y yo hablo español pequito. The Spanish were the second to have New Orleans and Spanish will be my second language. I met my Padrino when I was five. We were living in New Orleans at the time, but because of Hurricane Katrina and other circumstances I didn’t get to see him until nine years later. I never met my Madrina—she died before I was born—but her picture hangs above our mantle that holds our bobada at home.

You can see the Spanish in the way I call my dad Papi unless I’m agitated and how he calls me negrita when he is, (otherwise mija is usually used). How he blesses me “que Olofe tequida te mi compania mija” whenever Mama, Alma, or I sneeze. How I leave the house as my dad is jamming out to Mercedes Sosa’s song La Meza, and Che Guevara; I say “luego” and he responds “cuidate mija.” People hear my name, Corazon, and ask again—after the forever exclaimed “What!”—“Do you speak Spanish?”

I’m a socialite but people stress me out. I’ve been ethno-analyzed repetitively too many times. It makes me laugh sometimes when people ask why old black folks don’t put up with shit, it’s no wonder. I’m only 17 and I’m already past tired of it, but it’s a package deal, my pigment and its baggage. It’s like an undertow every time I meet someone new. I find myself questioning my integrity, juggling all the ethnicities I’m a part of, in terms of religion, pigment, culture, etc. Why do kids with their Spanish heritage prominent in the paint of their skin, the structure of their facial bones, get to claim their heritage but speaks not a lick of Spanish and haven’t tasted a home-cooked tamale? Yet I can’t claim my Jamaican heritage because I don’t have the accent. I’m not bitter about it, annoyed lots of the time, but mostly curious. Why am I not considered Hispanic? It’s not like my parents went on Nameberry to choose a pretty name. I have a Spanish name for specific reasons, to honor specific people, and a specific part of myself. Everywhere I look at myself I find myself wondering if I have the right to claim that part of my heritage. Am I like those other Americans who count the percent of their heritage to claim something they know nothing of? I don’t think so. I don’t claim 16% Cuban, 34% Jamaican, 34% American, 14% Native American, and 2% milk.

Everyone keeps going on about Africa. But it’s a continent, not a country, and even in the small countries that have one national language, their “country” is a colonial apparition with sub-cultures, dialects, languages, and tribes forcibly crammed together. So claiming I hail from Sierra Leone is quite impossible. People treat the countries in Africa like they treat the states in America, but it’s more specific. Think of it on a miniature scale. Think of street runners, not cross-country skiing. Sierra Leone is a good regional area, but I’m from the Mende Tribe. The tribes are the countries. Pro-black people all walk around wearing ankhs and preaching about Kemet (Ancient Egypt), but I find it humorous that they don’t seem to remember that Egypt is on the east coast of Africa. Its history is engulfed in the Mediterranean Sea intermingled Europe. Slaves came from West Africa; it’s very unlikely you’re Egyptian.

How can I, without actively searching, know so much Greek mythology, but little to none African mythology? The more I learn about this mysterious continent, I see the stories hidden behind the loudness of Europe, and under the cloaking armpit of Europe, Russia, and China, I find myself no longer upset about their unknown myths. Our stories will remain untouched and accessible only to us. What I find myself upset about is the abuse, neglect, and the people being taken advantage of. People are so fascinated with France. This is why most people learn French. Most aren’t looking to go to Haiti, or the many French-colonized and French-speaking areas of Africa. I particularly don’t like French. Someone once told me it was phonetic, I don’t see it, but whatevs.

I don’t visit the French Quarter much. It’s not really something New Orleanian residents do, unless for work or entertaining visiting friends. People come to New Orleans, sometimes learning French beforehand, to find that no one speaks French. Seriously, in my three years of living in my Papi’s home city I’ve only met one person who speaks French, that lives here. Maybe a few that speak creole french, Haitian or Cajun. But you can find the French in the Crescent City’s name, Orleans. You find it in accents on the homes and the street names. The gallery houses, where people crowd the balconies for parades. It’s honored in carnival season with the French title Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday). I believe that the only reason I would learn French is so that I’d go somewhere in Africa, but once I go there I’d find a local and learn their language: that mix of whatever French dialect and their ancestors’ native tongue.

New Orleans isn’t a tourist destination for me. When I look at the map and feel my wanderlust tug at the base of my stomach, I don’t see monuments and souvenirs; I see the people and I see in the lines of their elders’ skin the history between those folds. I see in the smiles and tears of their youth the boundaries of their customs. I realize that I’m my own mini New Orleans. With many histories. With third-world streets and first-world villages and a rich assortment of people. I’ve left out the Vietnamese, the Hondurans, the Haitians, the Natives, and other cultures dotting the mosaic of New Orleans because those aren’t my stories to tell. I haven’t uncovered them in me outside of my peers. I wouldn’t represent them well. I left out the religions, the story behind Mardi Gras and King Cake, the real truths about the wrongly represented Voodoo and Santeria, and the cloned practices of Christianity that so many have taken between their legs and into their souls.

I’m only 17 and haven’t gotten the chance to discover all the curves of myself. All the countries pasted together to make my body, languages tucked between my teeth and on the cusp of my lips, customs branded into my hands, and cultures fixed to my hips. New Orleans is my home. Jamaica is my home. Spanish (the language) is my home. English and all its dialects are my home. French is my annoying cousin. And everything else is added to my crown like wishes that once hung from a Kalpavriksha Tree but is now worn on the wrists and ankles of those fulfilled promises and thank yous.

New Orleans is remembered out of three soils kneaded and rolled out to bag the bones of her residents, the hidden stories, the specks of elements and minerals that make up the meat of those soils. I know the people blacklisted to the colonial standard of their pigments and disregarded for the sweat their ancestors spent to water the crops. I’m one of their children, hailing from queens in rags, that held the crown jewels molded into their teeth, and kings who wear their pride in the eyes of their babies. I cradle my head in its double consciousness and punch through the drywall of faith like Katrina. Wake up to water carrying my bed. The abused of this society count love in belated birthdays, but celebrated each day they make it to the bed alive. Deaths are brushed under the living’s rugged carpet after a celebration to honor their carbon footprint because we’re busy surviving and counting the cards at the table.

“Negrita!” Papi calls. Little black girl. I see the word negro and think the color black first. Negro. I see Spanish.

“Negrita,” Papi says, but in his voice there’s no persecution.

Read more essays from the History Between These Folds by purchasing a copy.

My name is Raheem Johnson. The city of my residence is New Orleans. I was born and raised in New Orleans. This is my city. I love my city. Now, many would say: “How could you love this city? It’s riddled with crime and it looks like a dump.” And I would reply: “Well, I love this city because this city and I are…the same. We are the same. Not by blood, but through overlapping realities in this very world. My life and the life of my city are entwined through our similarities and individuated through our differences.”

Now, many could say: “Are you crazy? How is a seventeen-year-old boy in any way similar to a 250-year-old city?” And I would reply: “Well, just like me, my city is an outsider. Not fitting in anywhere, and unique in our own ways. We love this. We love to feel…different. We may look weird to people, we may disgust people, and you may only want to spend a short time here for Mardi Gras, when people come to enjoy themselves, get drunk, and party like there’s no tomorrow. But there is a tomorrow. Tomorrows with repercussions. Tomorrows with rewards. Or even tomorrows with nothing, as if nothing ever happened the day before. That’s what my city and I look for. The tomorrows. The tomorrows of hope. Of promise. Of…whatever may come.”

Because there was a time when a tomorrow wasn’t promised. For me or my city. In 2005, my city was killed. Killed. Killed by the forces of the Heavenly Father himself. Why he did it, only Jesus himself may know.

In 2005, I suffered the same fate. I drowned. I loved the water but didn’t know how to swim. Consumed by water and pulled under by my own weight. Swallowed whole by a clear, cool darkness. My city and I were dead.

And when the waters receded and we were pulled from the depths of our murderers, all the others could do was stand in shock and grievance, fearing the worst had prevailed.

My city was killed by a Category Five, and I by a mere hotel pool.

But miracles happen. In many shapes and forms. Whether we notice them or not. Now, judging from the way I’m writing this and how New Orleans is a thriving city from which I bring this story to you, you can infer that miracles were given out that day.

Having recovered from disaster, I watch as my city’s recovery continues. New Orleans will always be my city, and I its citizen. Similar from the scars we share, both physical and mental, and from the past we can never disown. So we fear not death because we’ve seen its ways and it has nothing new to show us.

Now death is poised to strike America, because just like my city and me, America’s past can never be disowned. Through atrocities, progress was born. From the cracked backs and broken hands of my ancestors who built this very nation, to the death and near extinction of the natives whose blood cries out from the land that is now this United States, to the discrimination and conquest of millions worldwide that has given America its wealth and power.

Now with America’s 45th president, he wants to make America great again. He wants the progress America used to have back. As we’ve seen with the history of this nation, prosperity comes at the expense of others.

I’m glad he was elected because as long as we settle or come to terms with our current state we will never be moved or agitated enough to ask for better. This will be the decade of Death and Awakening. “How so?” you may ask. Well, now the ignorance, the people of this nation have had to the issues of inequality race and discrimination and the willingness to turn our backs and act as if nothing has happened will be put to death and in its place awakening will be installed as all those who didn’t believe discrimination was a problem in America will be awoken from a hypnotic sleep to realize it is a time for action. That’s why I’m glad Donald Trump is our president because now we can’t just sweep this under the rug and wait another four years for the next man to take office, to see if it is time to tackle the problem. Now we have a big problem on our hands and a big mess to clean up and we now can’t approach this as a whole or submit to it apart.

This will be the decade of Death and Awakening. This is the decade of Death and Awakening. The Decade of Death and Awakening has begun. And even if this worst occurs, miracles are prominent.

My trickster is a snake, and his name is Jose Lopez Jalson, and one day, he tricked his sister, a baby girl snake named Charlotte. He put a scary doll next to her, so that when she woke up, she screamed. 

Also he used to trick his mother a lot. One time, Jose tricked his mother into going outside to look at something, and she said, “What is it, Jose?” 

And Jose said, “It’s right there,” and he pointed in the distance. And then he turned around, and ran inside, and slammed the door and locked her out.

He used to trick a lot of people, too, and even babies who had just come out of their moms’ stomachs. The babies would cry, and after that he would yell, “Hahahaha, I tricked you!!” and he would run away very fast, like Flash. 

Jose was a mean snake, and he wore white Jordans, and he drove a blue Lamborghini. One time, he even tried to trick Donald Trump because he didn’t want him to become president. He went to the White House with all of his snake family members, and one was a big king snake. They slithered into every room in the White House, and they scared all of the Trump family members, including his daughter Ivanka. Donald Trump got so scared that he ran out of the White House, and they had to take him to the hospital he was so out of breath. The doctors had to calm him down. When he felt better, he went back to the White House and packed his clothes, and went in the kitchen, and the snakes were still there, and they had slithered all over the kitchen. 

So he said,  “I’m not living in the White House any more,” and he went to live in the Gulf of Mexico, and stayed there for the rest of his life. 

One day, Lisa and her alien friend from her home planet, Zooiftfoot, heard a loud bang. It was a great giant book, and the great giant book knocked down a willow tree. Lisa had ripped out all of the pages, 1-10,000 pages and ripped the cover off. Lisa did not want to be killed.

The great giant book went back to the brutal king. The brutal king was red hot and destroyed the great giant book. He was mad that he did not kill Lisa. The great giant book got blasted all the way to outer space.

Then, Lisa’s alien friend went back to her home planet. Her friends said, “I hope you visit one day. Bye bye.”

“One day, I will visit. One day, I will,” said Lisa.

Lisa was a curious girl, very curious. There was a greenhouse, that had moss growing all over it. People said the house was haunted. But, Lisa didn’t believe it. Lisa went into the haunted house, and she was walking around. She didn’t see anything ghostly. Then the ghost was waiting for the right time to cut her into four pieces. When Lisa passed by, the ghost cut her into four and she came back together. The ghost thought she was going to die. But it was just the brutal king coming down to bring her back home in outer space.  

Lisa refused to give the king the crown, that was protected by Oracle gems. Graymoor put Lisa in a dark dungeon. She escaped when Graymoor was too busy, trying to get Arianna and Natalia to tell them all of her secrets. They refused to tell Graymoor all of her secrets. Lisa had got the crown while he was too busy, trying to get Natalia and Ariana to spill her secrets.

When she got the crown, she got Graymoor to come out of the dungeon with Natalia and Ariana in it. When he came out, Lisa had destroyed the evil king and the minions. Lisa returned to earth, cast a spell, and freed the people in the black crystal.

When she cast the spell, she said, “Crystal Solvinda.” Lisa is staying on Earth, and they lived happily ever after.

On Sunday, January 15th, Big Class students shared their work at Writers Resist New Orleans, an event in collaboration with with PEN America, as part of a international day of readings championing freedom of speech, and the power of expression to change the world.

Quincy (Grade 8), Alekesis (Grade 8),  and Sanii (Grade 3) shared their work from our latest book, I Want You To Know Something About Me: Letters About The Election of Donald Trump by New Orleans Youth, available now to purchase here on our web site and at your local New Orleans book store.

Check out a few of the letters from I Want You To Know Something About Me: Letters About The Election of Donald Trump by New Orleans Youth.

Dear Obama,
You leaving the office makes me angry. I am
mad and angry because you were the first black president and you were president half my life. When you were president I felt safe. When I woke up and found out that D. Trump was president, my heart dropped.
But then, I realized that he isn’t my president. Barack Obama is forever going to be my president. Until another black president comes along like you, I’m going to pray that he doesn’t do anything stupid. He can’t send the majority of us to Africa because I was born in New Orleans. I’m going to start a rebellion against Trump and be a civil rights leader. I’m going to start an underground railroad and everything.
—QUINCY, GRADE 8
P.S. You forever are my president. 

Dear Donald Trump,
I’m not angry you’re president; I’m even more motivated to prove you wrong about the Black community.
I would like you to change your opinion of Blacks. All Black people aren’t criminals. For example, I am very ambitious about becoming the very first African American to become a doctor and model to make it out of New Orleans. I love where I came from because it gives me a different way of seeing the world.
I wake up and look at this day as another chance to prove myself to the world that I’m not just another kid from the hood living paycheck to paycheck. I’ve overcome a lot of things to become the person that I am today. You are a very disrespectful person, but you encourage me to do better.
—ALEKESIS, GRADE 8 

Dear Donald Trump,
I think you should fix the holes in the streets because it feels like our cars are going to break, and people would not like that.
Also, Donald Trump, I think you need to help with the environment. In our neighborhood it’s bad because our drains are bad, and when storms come, it floods because the drains are not fixed.
Also, Donald Trump, I would like to write about trees because if we don’t have trees, we will not have oxygen or paper, and so our animals will have freedom.
—TIJI, GRADE 6
P.S. Please read my note, and please make this change. 

Dear Viviana,
I know you’re really mad about Donald Trump being president, but don’t worry, it’ll all get better. I remember you telling me that when you were at school you talked about the election with your teacher and that she told you to just keep your head up high and not be afraid. I want you to take her advice and keep moving forward no matter what happens, okay?Today in school my teacher had us use the hashtags #iamthefuture and #icanchangetheworld, and he made us think about how we can change the world and how we are the future.
I realized that we are the future because we can change the world.
By just using the power of youth, we can make this earth better than it’s ever been, all it takes is young minds like yours and mine. Long story short, don’t be afraid because sooner or later you will be that voice that everyone looks up to.
Your Auntie,
—ASHANTI, GRADE 8