Quintin Collins
Angry While Black
I would like my anger to live in the world as your anger does. Reasonably, with expectations that it doesn’t make me who I am.
—Hanif Abdurraqib
The day after Charlottesville, where white supremacists marched
through America yet again, when I heard there were good people
on all sides, you told me I was too angry. You told me
I was taking it too seriously and needed to relax
when neo-Nazi flags and tiki torches bobbled in procession.
When racism lockstepped on my social media timelines,
you didn’t know white boys chased my mother to bus stops,
pelted her with rocks. You didn’t know another one slung
nigger out a car window once when I walked into work.
I say this plainly: With opportunity, they would shoot me
in the face. Don’t you dare try to silence me
when daily, I am cornered. I will elevate my voice
until every room edge has felt my echoes. I will churn
the tornado in my mouth until it scrapes this country clean.
Quintin Collins has works that have appeared or are forthcoming in Threshold, Glass Mountain, Eclectica, Transition, and elsewhere. A graduate of the Solstice MFA program, Quintin is a managing editor at a digital marketing agency, where he publishes writing craft blogs. If Quintin were to have one extravagance, it would be a personal sommelier to give him wine pairings for books.
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