William Evans
T'Challa has Seventeen Poems About Being A Father
They all start with hunting analogies
We once came upon a gazelle with a throat glistening with break…
Most of the poems are in form, rigid and always in control
It is why he will never be great, as a poet. It is why
the throne has forgotten his name.
Once the trappers caught me, they took my claws first…
Only one poem mentions Storm. She found it after
the tidal wave and returned it with the crown. T'Challa pretends
none of those three existed.
The arrows found you first and then last.
When he writes about having a son, he is writing about not having
a son. They are all poems about his father. They are all poems
about someone becoming more because someone
they loved is now dead. They are poems that don't believe
in the future.
The knife pulled back the black skin like an apology…
He writes about Luke Cage and James Rhodes and Sam Wilson
and how they were never given sons, either.
When they raised their rifles, I did not lie to you, who else could these
bullets be meant for?
The Author Watches Naruto As a Grown Man and Remembers The Blade
Even though I got to be a kid
in the hood, I didn't get
to be a kid in the hood watching
Naruto[1], but I imagine
I would've wished for the
Sharingan[2], my eyes a helicopter torque
of revolving
blood and black bodies that allowed
me to predict the movements
of my foes or rather the way
a sidewalk tried to fold itself
into my ankles and pull
me and the other
Chūnin[3] into its insatiable throat
or maybe I could
see the movements of the car that
swerved into my best
friend[4] like a pulpy question mark
when I watched the chakra[5] leave him drip by drip
like the Uchiha Clan[6]
symbol had been dipped
into what remained of his torso and
held above us like a genjutsu[7] where
we all got older watching him die again
and again inside
of our not ready bodies that didn't age
at all, but still interrupted my training
to be a shinobi[8] or something that fought
against the blade that hung above us
like stars that hate us for worshiping them, and when they
found another of my clanmates[9]
hollowed out[10] beyond the village with the police
standing over him claiming he was a jinchūriki[11],
my sharingan became Mangekyō[12]
and I tried to set Amaterasu[13]
flame to everything because a Black-
boy fire don't stop until something dies,
which typically is the Black boy
himself, but this be the ninja way or
at least
the way we accept that some
boys become leaves that get cradled in
the wind and never
seem to come back
to the earth even
when the war ain't
in our name, even when
we were born in the blood soaked shadow
of peace from our parents who
still wore the scars of the last great ninja
war[14] or the time my grandfather stood
in front of summoned hounds and refused
to run as to not bring shame on our clan,
but maybe it's good that Naruto wasn't
around when my peers were being
killed for their visual prowess on every
street corner because I didn't want to be Hokage[15]
of the hood, but just a rogue ninja who ain't been
back to the village since the night they came to
take my eyes too[16], and the boy's kunai slashed me across
the forearm and scarred me like a headband
struck through the middle that says I came from somewhere
but I now belong nowhere at all, like the wind
judging my clumsy size, turning me over
in its bandaged arms before it lifts me.
[1] A Japanese manga series written by Masashi Kishimoto.
[2] One of the three legendary eyes in the world with the power to record and predict movements, visually represented as a black wheel surrounded in red.
[3] Literally meaning: Middle Ninja, typically of the age of adolescence. See: Tamir Rice
[4] Marco S, d: 1992
[5] Life
[6] One of the noble clans of Konohagakure, the village at the center of the Naruto story. The Clan was massacred leaving very few survivors for fear that they would perform a coup on the village. See: Black Wall Street. See: Rosewood. See: Charelston, South Carolina, 2015.
[7] A jutso that creates illusions to control or torture it's targets, often causing the victims to relive horrors and lose the concept of physicality and time passage.
[8] Ninja. See: Black
[9] Trey T, d: 1993.
[10] Gut shot, ambulance arrived thirty five minutes later.
[11] Humans that have tailed beasts sealed within them. Often marveled at or feared by others. See: Officer Darren Wilson's account of why he shot and killed an unarmed Mike Brown: "That's the only way I can describe it, it looks like a demon, that's how angry he looked."
[12] An evolution of the Sharingan awakened by the trauma suffered from witnessing the death of someone close to the user.
[13] Black flame that cannot be extinguished by conventional means.
[14] The 1960s
[15] Generally regarded as the strongest shinobi in the village.
[16] Members of the Uchiha Clan were hunted for their Sharingan eyes so that others may possess their power. See: Cultural appropriation. See: College athletics. See: Ivory Coast.
They all start with hunting analogies
We once came upon a gazelle with a throat glistening with break…
Most of the poems are in form, rigid and always in control
It is why he will never be great, as a poet. It is why
the throne has forgotten his name.
Once the trappers caught me, they took my claws first…
Only one poem mentions Storm. She found it after
the tidal wave and returned it with the crown. T'Challa pretends
none of those three existed.
The arrows found you first and then last.
When he writes about having a son, he is writing about not having
a son. They are all poems about his father. They are all poems
about someone becoming more because someone
they loved is now dead. They are poems that don't believe
in the future.
The knife pulled back the black skin like an apology…
He writes about Luke Cage and James Rhodes and Sam Wilson
and how they were never given sons, either.
When they raised their rifles, I did not lie to you, who else could these
bullets be meant for?
The Author Watches Naruto As a Grown Man and Remembers The Blade
Even though I got to be a kid
in the hood, I didn't get
to be a kid in the hood watching
Naruto[1], but I imagine
I would've wished for the
Sharingan[2], my eyes a helicopter torque
of revolving
blood and black bodies that allowed
me to predict the movements
of my foes or rather the way
a sidewalk tried to fold itself
into my ankles and pull
me and the other
Chūnin[3] into its insatiable throat
or maybe I could
see the movements of the car that
swerved into my best
friend[4] like a pulpy question mark
when I watched the chakra[5] leave him drip by drip
like the Uchiha Clan[6]
symbol had been dipped
into what remained of his torso and
held above us like a genjutsu[7] where
we all got older watching him die again
and again inside
of our not ready bodies that didn't age
at all, but still interrupted my training
to be a shinobi[8] or something that fought
against the blade that hung above us
like stars that hate us for worshiping them, and when they
found another of my clanmates[9]
hollowed out[10] beyond the village with the police
standing over him claiming he was a jinchūriki[11],
my sharingan became Mangekyō[12]
and I tried to set Amaterasu[13]
flame to everything because a Black-
boy fire don't stop until something dies,
which typically is the Black boy
himself, but this be the ninja way or
at least
the way we accept that some
boys become leaves that get cradled in
the wind and never
seem to come back
to the earth even
when the war ain't
in our name, even when
we were born in the blood soaked shadow
of peace from our parents who
still wore the scars of the last great ninja
war[14] or the time my grandfather stood
in front of summoned hounds and refused
to run as to not bring shame on our clan,
but maybe it's good that Naruto wasn't
around when my peers were being
killed for their visual prowess on every
street corner because I didn't want to be Hokage[15]
of the hood, but just a rogue ninja who ain't been
back to the village since the night they came to
take my eyes too[16], and the boy's kunai slashed me across
the forearm and scarred me like a headband
struck through the middle that says I came from somewhere
but I now belong nowhere at all, like the wind
judging my clumsy size, turning me over
in its bandaged arms before it lifts me.
[1] A Japanese manga series written by Masashi Kishimoto.
[2] One of the three legendary eyes in the world with the power to record and predict movements, visually represented as a black wheel surrounded in red.
[3] Literally meaning: Middle Ninja, typically of the age of adolescence. See: Tamir Rice
[4] Marco S, d: 1992
[5] Life
[6] One of the noble clans of Konohagakure, the village at the center of the Naruto story. The Clan was massacred leaving very few survivors for fear that they would perform a coup on the village. See: Black Wall Street. See: Rosewood. See: Charelston, South Carolina, 2015.
[7] A jutso that creates illusions to control or torture it's targets, often causing the victims to relive horrors and lose the concept of physicality and time passage.
[8] Ninja. See: Black
[9] Trey T, d: 1993.
[10] Gut shot, ambulance arrived thirty five minutes later.
[11] Humans that have tailed beasts sealed within them. Often marveled at or feared by others. See: Officer Darren Wilson's account of why he shot and killed an unarmed Mike Brown: "That's the only way I can describe it, it looks like a demon, that's how angry he looked."
[12] An evolution of the Sharingan awakened by the trauma suffered from witnessing the death of someone close to the user.
[13] Black flame that cannot be extinguished by conventional means.
[14] The 1960s
[15] Generally regarded as the strongest shinobi in the village.
[16] Members of the Uchiha Clan were hunted for their Sharingan eyes so that others may possess their power. See: Cultural appropriation. See: College athletics. See: Ivory Coast.
William Evans is a writer from Columbus, OH. He is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of Black Nerd Problems and author of two poetry collections from Penmanship Books.
His work can be found in joint literary journal, Radius, Union Station Magazine and other online publications.
His work can be found in joint literary journal, Radius, Union Station Magazine and other online publications.