A Golden Shovel is a poetry form in which each word of an existing poem becomes the last word of each line of a new poem. It was created by poet Terrance Hayes in honor of Bronzeville’s own Gwendolyn Brooks, based off her classic poem “We Real Cool.”
After learning about it at a Young Chicago Authors workshop taught by Toaster Henderson, I’ve used it as a means of processing music and writing that sits with me. A particular concept around my art is the recognition of what has been made before me, and much of the art I do is inspired by another artist.
Chicago artist Saba released his second studio album, CARE FOR ME, on April 5, 2018. Much of it paid homage to his cousin, John Walt, who was murdered the prior year. The album speaks on depression, anxiety, and memory in ways that I hadn’t experienced much before. It quickly became my favorite album, and still is, and ultimately pushed me over the edge to make the decision to move to Chicago to live in its remarkably innovative art scene.
This poem is a Golden Shovel based on the last song in that album, “HEAVEN ALL AROUND ME.” It takes the perspective of his late cousin who’s in disbelief of his own murder. One of my hardest struggles in life is envisioning a future with me in it. After coming too close to death too many times and fighting too many institutions that have tried to push me towards it, telling myself that I’m alive has become a daily intentionality. Sometimes, that’s all that I can handle, and that’s okay.
For me, a new and radical future is one where I’m in it with the homies. We’re all okay. We’re all happy. We’re all making things that we want to and showing up late to work and getting no e-mails. While I don’t always know how to maintain that vision for myself, the art and vitality that is made here in Chicago has helped me see that future, and I’m magnificently grateful for it.
Y e l l i n ‘ a t m y m o t h e r l i k e , ” i k n o w y o u h e a r m e “
G e t a l i t t l e c l o s e r , r e p e a t
B u s d r i v e r p a s s m e u p , d o n ‘ t s e e m e
P a r a m e d i c s t a l k a b o u t w h a t h e n e e d
H e n e e d h i s o x y g e n , t h e y s e e m i n c o m p e t e n t ,
i s e e t h e c o n s e q u e n c e
I w a l k w h e n i c a n ‘ t h e a r t h e m , t h e y ‘ r e i n a u d i b l e
I g o t u p l i k e i g o t t a g o , f o r e n s i c s s e a r c h f o r f o l l i c l e
I p r o m i s e y ‘ a l l i ‘ m n o t a g h o s t , i p r o m i s e y ‘ a l l ,
L O O K:
On my quietest days I’m yellin’
From the back of my head at
Anything that doesn’t make me feel real. My
Biggest fear is that one day, I’ll have to tell my mother
About everything in this world that I don’t like.
How everything I know
Is nothing I can know for sure. You
Hear a ghost in the wind; I hear
A ghost in me
But when the world around me is at its loudest, things get
Easier to believe. In fact, I’ve taken a
Liking to noise. Lots of it. The days that have little
Going on are ones where myself and I become a bit closer,
And I’m not a person I want to get to know better right now. I repeat:
Give me more noise and I will show you what I can be with some care. Bus
Rides are my heaven. An overly nice and talkative CTA driver
Is my guardian angel. I feel the vibrato of voice pass
Through my skin and it’s all the proof I need that I’m still me.
Not that me is a dude I fuck with, but he’s someone I’d like to look up
To one day. Don’t
We all just want to see
Soft streets paved with gold and reasons all around us to smile? As for me:
That looks like no more work days and lazy paramedics
That will never have to touch a dead skin cell again. Here I am: I talk
Of heaven like it’s far away but I know that just about
Everything around me can be what
I need it to be. Imagine: a boy prays, and he
Doesn’t have to walk through hell to get the answers he need.
Imagine: a boy lives, and he
Doesn’t have to pray that he still will. I need
To stop calling this depression a sin. That boy needs to get his.
This world ain’t always gonna let him. I want a God that doesn’t need oxygen,
Hunger, anxiety, or suffering. They
Need to let me hug a new good moment here and there. I seem
To do better when I’m incompetent
About the bad things in me that I see
On some days more than others. The consequence
A God gives can tell me all I need to know about it. I walk
Into my mother’s living room when
Everything in me wants nothing to do with living and I can’t
Figure out why, and I hear
My insecurities telling me it’s too late. I let them
Bad thoughts get to me too much. They’re
Screaming at me, a choir of inaudible
Demons that I’m giving a chance. I got
So many days down behind me and up
In front of me. I like
To think I’ll see each of them. I gotta
find a God whose heaven is golden and go
To its church. I gotta find out the forensics
Of a God that doesn’t make me search
All over for
blessings. I want every single follicle
On my body to stay at ease. I promise,
If I find a good Bible that loves me back, y’all
will have a good man standing in front of you. I’m not
Asking for much. I just don’t want to be a ghost.
I promise
I exist, y’all
And I want to look
like it, without the halo and wings.
Please, don’t ever let me forget that
there’s heaven all around me,
there’s heaven all around me,
there’s heaven all around me,
there’s heaven all around
Davon Clark is a Lit and Layout editor of the Weekly. He likes flowers and the little things in life.