Reflection - Morgan Parker

Reflection: There are more beautiful things than Beyonce

When I read the first poem in Morgan Parker’s poetry book, I was struck at the manner of liviness. In her first poem, “ALL THEY WANT IS MY MONEY MY PUSSY MY BLOOD,” Parker instantly eases tension from the shouting title with the line, “Okay so I’m Black in America right and I walk into a bar.” This line may serve as a equilibrium for this poem or the entire book alone, something to remind readers to be cautious of, especially considering it carries such a strong book cover/title. Parker goes on to mention othersare hunting her and she knows “her pussy is real good because they said so.” This part grabbed my attention just as much as the title of the poem did because we hear her involve a third person who can either be the black man, whose beard she kisses, or the white man. My favorite aspect about this poem is her way of mentioning this over again but replacing words, changing line breaks, giving different imagery, all while carrying the same lines over again. One of the most straight to the point lines I could pick, from the many, is her saying, “I just want to understand my savings account.” This lines almost detaches from what she was tying into throughout her piece by suggesting a liberation of an education outside the realms of just books, math, science, etc, but real world problems one is expected to know on hand.

Reading Morgan Parkers work was very interesting in that I could not find just a couple poems I wanted to write about but rather multiple to even try to paint a storyline. Parker does an amazing job bringing pieces of her work to life, giving them feelings and how they perceive her. In her poem, “These Are Dangerous Times, Man,” she personifies a phone that seems to not obey her input. If you pick up your phone and input a function such as swiping, opening the camera, typing/sending a message, and so much more, your phone will code the program you want and give you a result in return. Even though oftentimes we get glitches because nothing is perfect and even technology is not as advanced as we think it it, Parker seems to think her phone is turning against her and, “the phone is racist.”

I try to write

a text message

to describe

all my feelings

but the emoticon hands

are all white.

Here Parker begins by emphasizing her trying to get a message across but her emotions seem to be more highlighted because she cannot write this message. In return, after suggesting the phone is racist, she goes on to give the phone an opinion, implying that, “the phone doesn't care about Black people. The phone is the nation that loves the phone.” In reading just that line, I felt that Parker was talking more about an individual rather than a phone or that she notices certain things from the lens of her phone that relate back to the line above.

The last two poems that had a much bigger image for me and I truly hope many more people have the privilege to read are “13 Ways of Looking at a Black Girl” and “The Gospel According to Her.” In the first poem I listed above, it sent back to a lecture from one of the three Black women at my high school who wanted other young Black girls to know their worth and be resilient in a world not catered for them. I remember sitting through the lecture and wanting someone to tell me the same thing and feeling envious that no one cared for me. It wasn’t until a little later that I could even begin to comprehend just how much Black women are at risk for. Even saying the word “comprehend” is nowhere near what I have the privilege of saying, I will never understand the struggles of a Black woman, even if I face different struggles of my own, no one can ever quite understand those struggles. Which is why reading this poem reminded me to appreciate every struggle but acknowledge those who have unwittingly struggled more. The poem is written in that it has 119 words, list 22 names (familiar ones or not), over 18 spaces in between some words (whether significant or not) and repeats the word sex 13 times. This poem has a strong image of how Black women are viewed by others/society and the emphasis of certain words serve the most impactful to those views. Parker list many Black influencers such as Nikki Giovanni, Nicki Minaj, Alice Walker, and even Sandra Bland, a 28-year-old African-American woman who was found hanged in a jail cell and ruled as suicide but we all know there is much more behind that. This poem is everything and I truly hope my other peers have reflected about this piece as well. The second poem listed above was a very short read but also served a strong purpose in that it left open questions for readers to interpret. The questions are straight to the point but leave room for a somewhat rhetorical approach to them, almost as if they are not meant to be answered. Also, it is very interesting that Morgan Parker switches between the words “slave” and “woman” and almost keeps it evenly distributed (slave 7, woman 6).

What to a slave is the fourth of July.

What to a woman is a vote.

Introducing the entire poem in this way provokes readers to create some of our own, figuring out what two things that might have had conflict in the past coincide with each other now, even if they still share the same lingering struggles.