The scene outside

the Superdome in the

aftermath of Hurricane
Katrina on Sept. 3, 2005.

SHANNON STAPLETON
 GENTRIFICATION, DISPLACEMENT, AND ANTI-BLACKNESS | 205

Bearing Witness
Through Poetry
By Renée Watson

“This is an oral history lesson

just in case the textbooks neglect the truth:
Natural disaster holocausts
are destroying the poor.
Tens of thousands of bodies lie in Haiti’s ditches.
Hundreds of deferred dreams drowned
in Katrina’s waters. . . ”

M
y high school students stood on stage performing their collaborative poem at
the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem. How fitting
that these budding protest poets would be given the opportunity to have their
voices rise in the Langston Hughes Auditorium. DreamYard’s annual spoken word po-
etry festival gave parents, teachers, youth, and even politicians a chance to witness New
York City’s teen poets speak their truth. I sat in the front row, beaming with pride, not
only because their performance went off without a hitch, but also because I knew these
students meant every word they were reciting. What started out as a compare-and-con-
trast assignment for a social issues unit turned into a piece of art. A declaration.
As a teaching artist in public schools, I am paired with classroom teachers to teach
poetry and to give students an opportunity to experience their academic curriculum
through the arts. At the beginning of the school year, I gave my students the ongo-
ing, yearlong assignment to watch the news, to pay attention. We studied Gwendolyn
Brooks, who wrote about Emmett Till, and Langston Hughes, whose poetry is a literary
commentary on the Black experience in America. “Great poets listen to their world and
speak back,” I told my students.
Our poetry class started off with the sharing of works in progress and the report-
ing of current events students felt passionate about. At that point, headlines and news
stories inspired students to write about human trafficking, Chris Brown and Rihanna’s
public display of domestic violence, and the HIV epidemic in the Bronx — where they
live.
Just after winter break, on Jan. 12, 2010, five years after New Orleans’ levees broke,
Haiti’s earth quaked. The next day, every student wanted to talk about it. But how do
you talk about something so devastating, so heartbreaking, without repeating clichéd
responses like “That’s so sad” or “Can you believe what happened?”
I encouraged students to look at the situation with empathy, but also with a critical
eye. Knowing many of them were working with their classroom teachers on sharpening
 206 | TEACHING FOR BLACK LIVES

their skills for writing compare-and-contrast essays, I asked them to apply what they were
learning to our poetry class. I posed the question: How do race and class affect the after-
math and recovery from a natural disaster?

A Study in Contrasts
I gave students the task of investigating the similarities and differences among three
natural disasters: Hurricane Katrina — New Orleans, 2005; the San Diego wildfires —
California, 2007; and the 7.0 Port-au-Prince earthquake — Haiti, 2010.
Most of my high school students were in elementary or middle school when Katrina
swept through New Orleans. They had faint memories of something bad happening in
Louisiana, but had no emotional connection to it and knew very few facts about the
aftermath of the storm. When I asked how many knew anything about the wildfires in
California, no one raised a hand.
The following week, I started class differently. I passed out the lyrics to Jay-Z’s rap
“Minority Report,” a four-minute history lesson about New Orleans. I decided to use
Jay-Z’s song to help students understand what took place in 2005. Using music in my
classroom has given many students who resist writing — especially poetry — a way in.
Printing out the lyrics for them helps me show
the similarities between verses and stanzas, and
We studied Gwendolyn students are able to point out literary devices

> Brooks, who wrote about

Emmett Till, and Langston
that singers and rappers often use.
I played the song and instructed students to
read along and underline lyrics that stood out to
Hughes, whose poetry them because they liked the way Jay-Z said it, or
is a literary commentary because they agreed. “Circle phrases you don’t
understand,” I added.
on the Black experience After students listened to the song, I led
in America. “Great poets a brief discussion. “What is this song about?
listen to their world and When did Katrina happen? How does Jay-Z feel
speak back,” I told my about how things were handled in New Orle-
ans?” Students volunteered to share what they
students. underlined and circled.
Many students underlined the lyric
“Wouldn’t you loot, if you didn’t have the loot?/
Baby needed food and you stuck on the roof.” Students also underlined phrases that
referred to how poor the people in New Orleans were before the hurricane. Several stu-
dents circled lines about the Superdome and the lack of water and supplies.
After discussing the song, I asked students to turn their handout over. On the other
side, a worksheet had a three-column chart with the headers Before, During, and After
at the top, and three rows labeled New Orleans, 2005 — Hurricane Katrina; San Diego,
2007 — Wildfires; and Haiti, 2010 — Earthquake.
I showed students a slide show with images of all three places before, during, and
after the tragedy. First, we watched the entire slide show without stopping it or talking.
 GENTRIFICATION, DISPLACEMENT, AND ANTI-BLACKNESS | 207

The second time through, I stopped the slide show and gave students time to fill out the
worksheet. In the images of life before, I asked, “What do you see?” “What do you notice
about the houses?” “How would you describe this community?”
When I showed the slides of San Diego, students blurted out, “I want to live there!”
“That house is tight!” Words students wrote in the “Before” column for San Diego in-
cluded fancy, wealthy, vacation, big.
When we looked at the slides of Haiti, one student pointed to the screen, which held
an image of children so thin their bones could be seen, and asked, “Is that really how
Haiti looked before the earthquake?”
The next slides showed the devastation that happens when storms come, fires spread,
and buildings crumble. Words students wrote in the “During” column were solemn:
death, destruction, demolished, memories vanished, helpless, fear, tragic. Whether the
house had been flooded, sizzled to ash, or collapsed to dust, it was clear that these three
places, which in the previous column had obvious disparities with regard to class, all
suffered enormous grief and loss.
The next photographs showed what happened in the immediate aftermath of each
natural disaster. “What do you see?” I asked again. For New Orleans, students noted:
crowds, handwritten signs pleading for help and for water, sick elderly people, despair.
For San Diego, students wrote: buffets, massages, sleeping on cots, pets playing with
their owners. And for Haiti: people sleeping outside in the dark, wounded people, sad-
ness, loss, dead bodies thrown on top of each other.
I gave students time to silently write a response to these images. “How do these imag-
es make you feel? What are your gut reactions to these images?” Students wrote for about
three minutes and then we discussed their findings.
I asked students not to draw any conclusions yet, but rather to share with the class
what they wrote on their chart. “Just tell us what you noticed,” I said.
The first comment was about the loss. “I noticed that all three places had a lot of
damage done to their homes.”
Another student saw that the homes in San Diego had cars parked in the driveway
and many of the homes in New Orleans didn’t.
“I noticed that the people in New Orleans looked hot, frustrated, and stranded, and
the people in San Diego looked relaxed and taken care of.”
“The people in San Diego looked organized and calm, and the people in New Orle-
ans and Haiti looked chaotic and a lot more stressed out.”

Adding Research to Rap

To help students add facts to their observations, we read the Associated Press article
“Football Stadium Now a Shelter for Fire Evacuees,” dated Oct. 23, 2007. I asked stu-
dents to add pertinent information to their charts. “This article will give you facts to add
to your feelings and observations,” I explained. Occasionally, I stopped the class to see
if anyone had a question or to make sure students understood the article. By the time I
finished reading the second paragraph, students were gasping in disbelief. The article
further explained what the images showed:
 208 | TEACHING FOR BLACK LIVES

San Diego — Like Hurricane Katrina evacuees two years earlier in New Orle-
ans, thousands of people rousted by natural disaster have fled to an NFL stadium,
waiting out the calamity outside San Diego and worrying about their homes. The
similarities ended there, as an almost festive atmosphere reigned at Qualcomm
Stadium. Bands belted out rock ’n’ roll, lavish buffets served gourmet entrees, and
massage therapists helped relieve the stress for those forced to flee their homes
because of wildfires. . . .

The New Orleans evacuees had dragged themselves through floodwaters to get to
the Louisiana Superdome in 2005, and once there endured horrific conditions without
food, sanitation, or law enforcement.
I also read them an article from the New York Times, Jason DeParle’s “What Happens
to a Race Deferred,” which I first discovered in Linda Christensen’s essay “Hurricane Ka-
trina: Reading Injustice, Celebrating Solidarity.” After looking at a graph in the article
titled “The Reach of Poverty in New Or-
leans,” which details by race who had cars
and who did not, students began to draw
I mentioned Jay-Z’s song as an
> example of an artist who lent
his pen to a cause. “Write your
conclusions about how race and class play
a role in natural disasters.
It was clear to students that there
version of ‘Minority Report.’” were many differences in the response,
resources, and rebuilding of New Or-
leans and San Diego. I asked students,
“What do you have to say “Why do you think there is such dispari-
to New Orleans, San Diego, ty? Should anything have been done dif-
Haiti?” I asked them. “What do ferently? If so, what? Why or why not?”
you want to say to America?” Students were full of answers and
suggestions. “If the government knew
the people of New Orleans didn’t have
much to begin with, they should have
been more prepared to handle something like Hurricane Katrina,” Urias answered.
Destiny pointed out that maybe by 2007, two years after Katrina, the government had
learned a lesson and that’s why Qualcomm Stadium had so many resources. “And besides,”
she added, “Hurricane Katrina affected everybody in New Orleans. But not everyone in
San Diego had to leave their home, so more people were able to volunteer and help out.”
Lydia saw her point, but was adamant that more could have been done for Louisiana.
“But five days?” she yelled. “They had no water for five days!”
“How is it that we can get stuff to other countries overnight but can’t help our own?”
Vaughn asked. “I’m not saying California didn’t deserve help, I just think that New Or-
leans deserved it, too.”
After comparing the hurricane and the fires, we took a closer look at the earthquake.
Students learned that Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, and they
quickly drew the conclusion that if, five years later, New Orleans was still rebuilding,
 GENTRIFICATION, DISPLACEMENT, AND ANTI-BLACKNESS | 209

Haiti had a long road ahead. “I think it’s good that everyone is donating money to them
now, but where were all these donations before the earthquake?” Urias asked.
I didn’t want to end the discussion, but I needed to bring our conversation to a close,
so I could prepare students for their assignment and end class. I could tell students had
lingering questions and I wanted to give them a chance to ask them. I tore pieces of blank
scrap paper and handed out colored strips to the students, asking them to write down any
question or thoughts that they didn’t get to share. They didn’t have to put their name on
the slip of paper. I explained that we might not be able to answer their question in class, but
that they should search out the answer. The slips of paper included the following questions:

• What would happen if a tragedy took place in New York City? Would Times
Square be restored before neighborhoods in the Bronx?
• Do the poor know how to save money? Do they have enough money to save for
a “rainy day”?
• How does a homeowner choose an insurance policy?
• Are there places that are currently in great need but may never get help unless
tragedy strikes them?
• Whose responsibility is it to help the poor?
• Will history books tell the truth about what happened in New Orleans?

Although not the purpose of our class, these questions could lead into units on a variety
of issues in many different subjects, including math, economics, and history. Students were
beginning to see that what happened in New Orleans and Haiti — and what happens in
their neighborhood — is rooted in deep issues that span a variety of aspects of their lives.

“What Do You Have to Say?”

In our next class, students began their poems. I mentioned Jay-Z’s song as an example of
an artist who lent his pen to a cause. “Write your version of ‘Minority Report.’”
“What do you have to say to New Orleans, San Diego, Haiti?” I asked them. “What
do you want to say to America?”
I encouraged my students to incorporate phrases from the articles, the rap, their
free-write, and their chart into their poems. “You’ve collected a lot of information and
documented your feelings very well. Use the material you’ve gathered in your piece,” I
instructed. “If you don’t know how to begin, state a fact from the article or a lyric from
the song and start from there.”
Students got right to work. And so did I.
Whenever possible, I model doing the assignment so that students see and hear a
“real writer’s” process, and so that I encounter possible frustrations and stumbling blocks
before they do. I let them hear my first drafts, revise them, and read them to the class
again as an example of how even adult writers revise and edit their work. I also want to
show my students that I am willing to take the risks I daily ask them to take. To write
their opinions; to express their anger, hurt, and joy; to shout out questions to a world
that may not respond with the answer they hoped for is a brave thing. I encourage them
210 | TEACHING FOR BLACK LIVES

to take those risks with me.

After everyone’s poem was complete, I took lines from all of our poems and com-
bined them to create a collaborative piece.
Destiny and Vaughn both wrote about the lack of resources in New Orleans:

2005.
New Orleans flooded. . .
they named it
Hurricane Katrina.
And Katrina means Pure.
But the Superdome
had no pure water. . .

New Orleans,
for five days
you drank your salty tears
and there were no medical supplies
for your heartache.

And the ignorant asked: Why didn’t

you get out?
Not realizing the poor have no cars to
drive to hotels to wait out a storm. . .

Urias, Lily, and Jazmin created stanzas about the neglect of Haiti:

Haiti’s earth quaked

five years after New Orleans’ levees broke.

And we are the aftershock. Shocked

that it took a catastrophe to pay attention to the poor.

Why is it that it takes tragedy to unify a world?

Haiti, we never remembered you. We knew your people

stood in line for their only meal of the day — beans and rice —
and we looked away.

Long before buildings barricaded your

children under tons of bricks
we knew you were the poorest country
in the Western Hemisphere.
And we looked away. . .
 GENTRIFICATION, DISPLACEMENT, AND ANTI-BLACKNESS | 211

Denisse, who takes dance classes, volunteered

to create an interpretive dance to go along with the
My students joined
poem. She rallied her peers together to rehearse out-
side of class. Observing them practice, I realized that,
just a month before, all they could articulate about
a new generation
of poets committed
<
Haiti was that what happened was “sad,” “a tragedy,” to being recorders,
“so unfortunate.”
Now, they had facts and critical ideas to support
responders, rebukers,
them as they expressed their emotions. They took the rejoicers, and
skills they learned with their classroom teacher and ap- rebuilders.
plied them to their art. And instead of keeping silent,
instead of hiding their questions, fears, and frustra-
tions, they did what the poets they studied have done:
They sounded the alarm. “Every time we say this poem, people will remember,” Destiny
told me. She understood that her words would not change what happened and her teen-
aged wallet might not be able to donate funds for recovery, but she could lend her pen.
Her voice.
There was a consensus in the group: “This is a tribute for people everywhere who are
struggling. We have to make it special.”
And they did.
And what happened on stage, in Langston’s beloved Harlem, was more than a poetry
recital. My students joined a new generation of poets committed to being recorders, re-
sponders, rebukers, rejoicers, and rebuilders.
What happened was the rising of voices:

Santa Ana winds come again.

Blow relief to the 9th Ward, to Haiti . . .
Let the fire of revival spread to Bourbon Street and Port-au-Prince . . .
Let our words be the rope you hang onto. May they pull you out of the
rubble.
Syllable by syllable let each verb,
each noun
build a fortress on your insides. Strengthening the levees of your soul

so you do not break.

May you never break.

And if the history books forget to add

a footnote apologizing
for not being proactive but reactive . . .
take this account. Take this truth
and write it in stone. Carve an
evacuation plan
212 | TEACHING FOR BLACK LIVES

and post it in every poor city, every

desolate nation . . .

there is a way out . . .

tell every child that lives lacking: As long as you can speak you
can survive
because words are seeds and this oral
history will bring a harvest.
We plant your name in the ground
of hope,

Haiti.
New Orleans.
Ethiopia.
Flint, Michigan.
Bronx, New York.
You will not be forgotten. . . . You will rise. You will rise
because we will lift you up.

Renée Watson is an author, educator, and activist. Her young adult novel, Piecing Me To-
gether, received a Newbery Honor and Coretta Scott King Award. She is the founder of I,
Too Arts Collective, a nonprofit housed in the brownstone where Langston Hughes lived and
created.

RESOURCES
Associated Press. Oct. 23, 2007. “Football Stadium Now a Shelter for Fire Evacuees.” MSNBC.com. msnbc.msn.com/
id/21435605/
DeParle, Jason. Sept. 4, 2005. “What Happens to a Race Deferred.” The New York Times. .nytimes.com/2005/09/04/
weekinreview/04depa.html
Jay-Z. 2006. “Minority Report.” Kingdom Come. Roc-a-Fella Records.