Finna by Nate Marshall

Author:Nate Marshall [Marshall, Nate]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2020-08-11T00:00:00+00:00

Native Informant

i’m deprogramming y’all wit’ uncut slang shit.

—Black Thought

when i say Chicago

capital city of the flyover.

crown jewel of the jailhouse.

a town in love with its own blood,

a blood browned on its own history & funk.

hometown of the riot & the riot gear,

the gang & the loitering law.

misfit blocks of dark-skinned cousins &

thick knuckled slavic uncles

who call each other their worst names.

what this country know ’bout a rustbelt

dipped in salt & vinegar & sold as

marked up & rustic?

my city is the city.

not your close enough suburb not

subject to the suppression of tape

& the tapping of phones.

how can you say anything about our blocks

& schools & children that you refuse to see.

don’t tell us what is wrong

with all of our cousins you’ve never known.

you do not govern what you do not love.

when i say Chicago

i mean that first Haitian cat who could pronounce it right.

when i say Chicago

i mean the stopped & frisked.

i mean the euphemism of frisk.

i mean the beat down & tight cuff.

i mean the drop-off in Bridgeport

or Mount Greenwood.

i mean the lessons

taught to an uppity one.

when i say Chicago

i mean the lake

(& i mean all of it).

i mean the candy lady at Rainbow

& the paleta man at Calumet

& the kids careening across the green at Montrose

& the jogger in midwinter daring a death for fitness

when i say Chicago

i mean Cabrini & Stateway & Ickes & Ida,

the city i’ll tell my kids about in the past tense.

i mean the rents that sometimes

make me mean Georgia or Indiana or Dolton.

when i say Chicago i mean

the restaurants with no chairs

just a window, a bulletproof sneeze guard.

i mean a Michelin star for all the ethnics slanging

their seasoned meats & language.

when i say Chicago i mean my mama’s

house that was my grandma’s house.

i mean the neighborhood

that was our neighborhood

because we said

we’ll make a home here

& we’ll stay.

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