Before German mothers wrapped scarves around
their heads,
kissed their own mothers good-bye and headed across
the world
to Bushwick-
Before the Italian fathers sailed across the ocean
for the dream of America
and found themselves in Bushwick-
Before Dominican daughters donned quinceanera
dresses and walked proudly down Bushwick Avenue-
Before young brown boys in cutoff shorts spun their
first tops and played their first games of skelly on
Bushwick Streets-
Before any of that, this place was called Boswijck
settled by the Dutch
and Franciscus the Negro, a former slave
who bought his freedom.
And all of New York was called New Amsterdam,
run by a man
named Peter Stuyvesant. There were slaves here.
Those who could afford to own
their freedom
lived on the other side of the wall.
And now that place is called Wall Street.
When my teacher says, So write down what all of this means
to you, our heads bend over out notebooks, the whole cla**
silent. The whole cla** belonging somewhere:
Bushwick.
I didn't just appear one day.
I didn't just wake up and know how to write my name.
I keep writing, knowing now
that I was a long time coming.