Obama's Children: Poems, by Earl S. Braggs represents a universal quest for human dignity and acknowledgement made specific through the Black experience.

Steve's Short-Sleeve Shirt

Steve's short-sleeve shirts were almost always cut-off,

winter plaid,

flannel shirts as if he knew a next winter

might not come.

Back in '71, he grew an ugly afro that

he couldn't figure out how to be proud of, too thin to hold

an afro pick. We were riot-night running buddies,

best friends in the best of times, the worst of times.

We rode the same dull pencil-yellow school bus

during those turbulent school-house years. Our English teacher,

Mrs. Davis, we loved

like young boys love pretty teachers, but

Mrs. Davis wasn't pretty. White as composition notebook

pages, she taught the deconstruction of complex sentences

written in black and white and red.

Unfazed by head rags of race war, she stole our attention,

kept it, never intending to give attention back. We didn't

want it back, anyway. She loved Steve, I loved Steve. We all did.

Steve didn't grow up with us. He moved from the country

to the city our freshman year. Project still-life, still, somewhat,

new. The comprehension of such, I don't think he ever, fully,

wanted to figure out how to measure. Steve was beyond.

...