Public education

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOP

P is for public
Public education
Where learning begins at the metal detectors
Detecting what can’t be brought in
Never scanning deep enough to decipher the pain
If the machine could really see what we bring to school
It would sound the alarm.

This generation is full of dreamers
Listen to your youth
No longer will we hide
The only thing we are guilty of bringing to school is our imagination
We snuck visions up our sleeve
 And in our mouths we have hidden tongues
Blades of truth
This is a rally cry.

Things have got to get better

Im afraid, that I’ll be stuck here like the hands on the clock of my classroom
Why don’t any of the clocks work?
A clock that goes silent is a dangerous thing
No tick tick tick
To tell you how much time has been wasted
No tick tick tick
To tell you how much time is left
Im ticked and stuck.

Stuck like the gum on the steps
The sticky left overs of thrown away lunches
Candy wrappers and spilled juice
Stuck to the bottom of my shoes

Didn’t the janitors clean yesterday?

It’s hard to move, when no one really expects you too.
Things have got to get better

I am more than just a test score, but numbers determine my future
Speak to me before I ever open my mouth,
I am ranked
By my answers on multiple choice questions
Leaving me with a few choices if I fail
And even though my voice quakes earth
And my pen penetrates poverty
I am not good at math
I have never been good with numbers.

But I know a basketball player’s salary divided by three is enough to pay my teachers what they deserve
Enough to buy books for every child in every inner city school
Enough to buy doors for bathrooms stalls

Can I get some privacy?

Things have got to get better

I am not waiting for super man
This isn’t a fairy tale
I am waiting for the exterminator and plumber to come
There are as many rats in public schools as there are students
And the water fountains don’t work,
Fountains don’t always hydrate

I’m waiting for the day public schools are like 5-star restaurants
Where the food in the cafeteria nourishes me
I am waiting for my report card to reflect the truth of what I know.
I am waiting for my teacher to start teaching.

Don’t my dancing feet,
My balance during pirouettes,
My jumps prove that I master physics?

I am waiting for my life to intersect with my education
Teach us how to turn does graffiti stained desks, and turn then into Picasso paintings
How to see Shakespeare in the lyrics we sing.
No more used up hand-me-down- lessons,
Make the curriculum hands on
Teach me how to mix compounds and elements
How to verb nouns
Teach me the world and make me feel like I’ve travelled it

Teach us the alphabet
In English and Spanish
In Swahili, Yoruba, Somali and Arabic, so we can speak to the nations
Teach us how to write
How to write our future,
How to dance away our Bronx blues

How to sing louder that the voices that tell us we’re less than
How to drown them out with our capabilities

Teach us the alphabet

Sing it with us,
So you understand how hard it is to balance the weight of words on a tongue

Things have got to get better (2x)

Let it begin now, let it begin with this


ABCDEFGHIJKLMOP

Choreo-poem written by Denisse Cotto, Lydia Villa and Destiny Campbell Edited by Renee Watson

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