-10/09/20 the New York Times-

from the Arts pages: “Young Black Poets”

reading their poems, standing their ground,

pleading their cases steadfastly,–– but quite simply

from my frame of reference, impossibly young.

all of them revisited.

all of them rising with each visit.

one sticks with me this morning;

is heard over and over again

with the click of the keyboard’s mouse.

her name is Akilah Toney.

her poem is titled: “Insecure Words”

written and spoken in her language and with an attitude.

my biggest fear at her age was being called out on strikes,

standing flatfooted at the plate, the inquisition

of baseball pressed upon my youthful shoulders.

but Toney’s poem is born of an inexhaustible blood.

Teacher redlines her sentence for the sake of gramma. then another

and another; redlined; dismissing her like he knows her address.

I hear her over coffee. the sunlight steps through the drawn

venetian blinds; the horizontals follow the planet's rotation.

Toney's young, but her voice strengthens her age. empowers the atmosphere.

maybe I’m too old to keep up, too white to get it, but maybe with enough

life in me to realize what it is I don't know.

I turned to the home plate umpire who in my eyes made the right call wrong.

Akilah Toney's fierce glance into her world is redlined simply for being.