In 2010, six black teenagers drowned in the Louisiana Red river. Researchers found that seventy percent of Black people do not know how to swim, that Black kids are three times more likely to drown. The question became: why do Blacks possess the fear of water?
I’ve heard sharks followed slave ships crossing the Atlantic ocean, trailing black bodies thrown overboard. I heard during slave time, white masters refused to let blacks learn them to swim ‘cause a swimming slave could get away, could swim to freedom, could figure out a way to wade in the water. I heard that lil’ Black kids ain’t nothing but gator bait; gator bait let you catch an alligator so big, so vicious, it bite like racism. Black mamas be like: “keep your kids out the water, it ain’t safe, child.” I heard a Jim Crow North and a Klu Klux South kept coloreds out of public swimming pools, and off public water fountains. I heard they hosed niggas down with a fire fighter water hose, like you hose down a rabid dog in the summertime heat.
In New Orleans, I heard come hell or high water, they were gonna watch niggas drown in a hurricane down South, heard they knew the levies was gonna give in and break, knew the waters was coming to wash niggas away, tell me—how do a nigga keep they head above water if niggas can’t swim, niggas can’t doggie paddle, niggas can’t tread water, niggas jump, but never jump in--I sprint; you swim--niggas can’t float ‘cause our bodies too dense, don’t fvck with the rain ‘cause our hair just got did.
I heard yesterday, in Detroit, they cut the water off. I heard the water don’t run, I heard the faucets run dry, I heard kids are dehydrated—niggas is thirsty—heard they’ve been gasping for air, been drowning in oppression for what feels like forever. Ever since crossing the Atlantic been feeling lost at sea, been feeling like a fish outta water, like a body sinking in the deep end, like treading troubled waters and drowning.
snowghoul
jbbartram-illu
theartofmadeline
2087
dededos
germansingergirl
kianamaiart
titsay
